Sarah Orne Jewett to Sara Norton
Monday morning
[ 4 January 1897 ]*
[ Begin deleted letterhead ]
South Berwick.
Maine.
[ End deleted letterhead ]
My dear Sally
I have had a letter from Mrs.
Warner* in which she proposes next week for our visit -- Tuesday
^ 12th -- ^,* Wednesday & Thursday -- or
the same days the week after. Should you like to go next
week, which seems best for me? I suppose that Mrs. Warner will
like to know as early as possible
but I think that we can have a word about it on Wednesday when I hope to see you.
Yours most
affectionately
S. O. Jewett.
Notes
1897: This date was assigned by Richard Cary, but his
rationale is unknown. It is the case that January 4 fell
on a Monday in 1897.
12th: This date is penciled in, presumably by
Jewett, or perhaps by Norton.
Mrs. Warner: Cary notes that "Mrs. Charles Dudley Warner
(1834-1921) was a leader in the intellectual life of Hartford,
Connecticut, with a major interest in music. A brilliant concert
pianist, she helped organize and played with the Hartford
Philharmonic Orchestra. Her home, like Mrs. Fields's, was a
magnet for lovers of art, literature, and music." For her
husband, see Key to Correspondents.
The manuscript of this letter is held by Colby College Special
Collections, Waterville, ME: JEWE.1. Richard Cary included
his transcription in Sarah Orne Jewett Letters.
New transcription and notes by Terry Heller,
Coe College.
6 Jany 1897*
Gentlemen
Notes
1897: The page has two holes punched at the top. In the top left corner are initials, possibly M.W. In the bottom left corner is this note: Sent -- F.J.G, for Francis Jackson Garrison. See Key to Correspondents. Presumably the receipt she mentions was on the other half of this page, which seems to have been torn away, perhaps on all 4 sides.
34 Beacon Street: The Boston address of Susan Burley Cabot. See Key to Correspondents.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University in Houghton Mifflin Company correspondence and records, 1832-1944, Jewett, Sarah Orne, 1849-1909. 68 letters from; 1870-1907 and [n.d.]. MS Am 1925 (962). Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Kate Knowlton Foote*
[ 1897 ]*
[ Begin letterhead ]
South Berwick.
Maine.
[ End Letterhead ]
Thank you for your New Year letter of good wishes which I return most sincerely for you and your household and this means the boys wherever they are. I am very sorry that you should have had such a severe illness last year -- as you say one does not get over
such an attack and shock for a long time. I hope indeed that the winter weather is making you feel stronger and better. Thank you for all the kind words you say about the Pointed Firs which seems to me like a later Deephaven* in a sort of way though I did not think about that when I
was writing -----
We are all as well as usual. I have come to town for a while since I got your letter. Theodore* is at school here for his last year before going to college and that brings us all here more than usual while he comes home pretty often. You will hardly realize that he is so nearly
grown. Grown in stature he certainly is! Please give my best and kindest remembrance to Mr. Foot [so spelled] and I wish the best new year for you both.
Sarah O. Jewett
Notes
Foote: It is not certain that this is the person addressed in this letter. The spelling is a problem, when, at the end, Jewett asks to be remembered to Mr. Foot. The identities of "the boys" remains in question as well, as the Footes who seem likely recipients are not yet known to have had sons. See Key to Correspondents.
1897: Jewett notes Kate's compliments for The Country of the Pointed Firs, which began Atlantic Monthly serialization in January 1896. One could not have read the whole book until late in 1896.
Deephaven: Jewett's first novel appeared in 1877.
Theodore: Theodore Jewett Eastman. See Key to Correspondents.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Small Library, University of Virginia, Special Collections MSS 6218, Sarah Orne Jewett Papers. Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Mary Rice Jewett
[ January 1897 ]
…………….Oh your sister has got such a letter from Mr. Rudyard Kipling!* The Life of Nancy* letter was truly beautiful to her heart --- but this one!! If you can wait till Tuesday you shall see it Mary. Mr. Norton sent them the Pointed Firs,* and it is such a letter. I keep thinking of things to tell you when I write next, and then other things shake them off my head. I ought to carry round a book with a pencil tied on. So no more at present from
a Sister
Notes
The line of points presumably indicates an omission from the manuscript.
Mr. Rudyard Kipling: See Key to Correspondents.
The Life of Nancy: Jewett's story collection, The Life of Nancy (1895).
Kipling's letter on this book appears in The Letters of Rudyard Kipling: Volume 2: 1890-1899, dated 16 October 1895. He singles out "Fame's Little Day," "The Only Rose," and "All My Sad Captains" as favorites, but has especially high praise for "The Guests of Mrs. Timms: and "The Hilton's Holiday." He complains about "A War Debt": "Did you in the War Debt (serial form) put in those four lines italic at the end: because I don't remember having seen them and -- I don't like them. They explain things and I loathe an explanation. Please cut 'em out in the next edition and let people guess that he married Mrs Bellamy's grand daughter." He also says, "To my thinking Miss Jewett can be when she thinks fit, masculine enough to equip three small average male story-tellers and in "The Guests of Mrs Timms" she gives proof of it. It's a kinder dry-point, firm handed work that pleases me all over."
Mr. Norton sent them the Pointed Firs: American author and Harvard professor, Charles Eliot Norton (1827-1908). Norton has sent Kipling and his wife, Carrie, as a Christmas present a copy of Jewett's The Country of the Pointed Firs (1896).
Kipling's letter on this book appears in The Letters of Rudyard Kipling: Volume 2: 1890-1899, dated January ? 1897. He reports that he and his wife both have read the book already more than once each. He says: "It's immense -- it is the very life. It's out and away the loveliest thing of yours I've ever read. It -- made me homesick! ... So many of the people of lesser sympathy have missed the lovely New England landscape; and the genuine breadth of heart and fun that underlies New England nature." He says that this is "the reallest New England book ever given us.... Joanna alone is an idyl worth fifty average pretentious books; and Mis' Blackett is worth another fifty. It's all a most perfect piece of art, truth, beauty and tenderness; and I'm proud as a peacock to think I've met and known you." In a post script he says, "I don't believe even you know how good that book is."
This text is from transcriptions from mixed repositories in the Maine Women Writer's Collection, University of New England, Letters from Sarah Orne Jewett, 1875-1890, Undated Letters, Folder 75, Burton Trafton Jewett Research Collection. For more information about the individual transcription, contact the Maine Women Writers Collection. Notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Robert Collyer to Annie Adams Fields
New York Jan 19th 1897
Dear Friend
I am main glad to hear from you for all sakes.* I may say of the books each one as Touchstone says of Audry* a poor thing but mine own and also tell you I have some more I will give you some day if you stay a good Lassie. I have read yours* with pure pleasure. It is a lovely Idyll that's what it is and I will read it again anon as I read some dozen to twenty. How do you manage to be always so fresh{?} but I know it is because yours is not a cistern but a fountain fresh as the great fountain on the moorside at Ilkley* we trace back about 500 years and the inscription over the great old Bath reads{:} This Bath holds 1150 gallons and fills in 13 minutes. So it ran when Severus* came to the rescue of Virius Lupus and gave the name to Severs Hill above the town. When the Longfellow gave bluff old Harry* [ unrecognized number 6 ? ] pence to fight the French and there it runs still fresh and full out of the mountain side and I dream that the good king Edwin 627* and
Notes
sakes: Collyer omits many periods in this letter. I have supplied them wherever they seem necessary.
Touchstone ... Audry: Touchstone a jester and Audrey, a country girl, are characters in As You Like It (1599), by British playwright, William Shakespeare (1564-1616). Touchstone makes his remark in Act 5, Scene 4.
yours: Fields's new book in 1897 was Life and Letters of Harriet Beecher Stowe.
Ilkley: Ilkley in Collyer's home region of West Yorkshire, became a popular spa town in the 19th century, known for its healthful cold-water springs at White Wells.
Severus: Probably, Roman emperor Lucius Septimus Severus (145-211), who consolidated Roman rule in Britain during the 3rd Century and attempted the conquest of Caledonia or Scotland. Virius Lupus (c. 160 - after 205) was his governor in Britain from 197.
Longfellow gave bluff old Harry: Collyer refers to his own history Ilkley: Ancient and Modern (1885), where he recounts the achievements of King Edwin of Northumbria (586- c. 632), who was converted to Christianity in 627. Several men named Longfellowe appear in the book, but it is not clear whether one of them contributed to Henry VIII (Bluff Harry) for war against the French.
Hannah Williams: Little is yet known of Hannah Williams, but she apparently was an acquaintance of his family in West Yorkshire. She is mentioned in Old Yorkshire (1881) edited by William Smith, with an introduction by Robert Collyer.
The transcription of "H-mass" is uncertain, though almost certainly Collyer refers to Christmas, which was celebrated a few weeks before this letter.
both: Fields and also Sarah Orne Jewett. See Key to Correspondents.
The transcription of "jintly" is uncertain, but it appears Collyer is rendering "jointly," a legal-sounding term, in dialect.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Huntington Library, San Marino, CA, in the James T. Fields Papers and Addenda Box 10: mss Fl 1-5637. Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Susan Cornelia Clarke Warren* to Sarah Orne Jewett
Mrs. Warren* requests the pleasure of Miss Jewett's company at lunch, Thurs. Feb. 4, at half past one o'clock --
Jan. 28.
[ 1897 ]*
Notes
Warren: Susan Cornelia Clarke Warren (1825-1901) is remembered as a philanthropist and art collector, specializing in porcelain and watercolor. Her husband Samuel Dennis Warren (1817-1888) was a Boston paper manufacturer and founder of the Cumberland Paper Mills in Westbrook, ME. They had a residence at 67 Mt. Vernon St. in Boston. See Samuel Dennis Warren, September 13, 1817-May 11, 1888: A Tribute from the People of Cumberland Mills pp. 5-11.
1897: This date is speculative. February 4 fell on Thursday in 1886, 1892 and 1897. Jewett is known to have been in Boston at this time in 1897. In 1892, she was in South Berwick and less likely to be able to attend. Jewett's activities in January-February 1886 are less well-known. While 1897 seems more probable, still the other dates remain possible.
Marie Thérèse de Solms Blanc to Annie Adams Fields
This letter was composed in French; a transcription follows the translation.
Dear Annie,
I think Mr. B* will have sent you the requested telegram. I immediately sent him the passage of interest to him from your letter, and he replied, asking eagerly that I thank you, but adding that he was in a
rather delicate situation, having refused to speak at Radcliffe because of what he saw as their ridiculous offer. He was intending to go only to Cambridge and Boston, and only as a visitor. I understood that he was thinking he'd have no chance
All this is just between us two, is it not dear Annie? -- I added that Boston was the city where he would be most appreciated, where the Revue [ des Deux Mondes ] had the most readers. In short, I hope that he has sent you a confirmation, but I am far from all the news, in the countryside, under the snow.
From time to time I go to Paris for my business and the dinners I cannot avoid. Next week, I will see B.... ----- Won't you come with Sarah* to join me when I am in Baltimore? It would be such a party!
I embrace you both tenderly. ThB
if you see Mr. Higginson* tell him that the friend he told me of never came.
[ Cross-written down the left side of page 6 ]
In addition, I will write to him.
Your book* has me passionately interested.
How delicious is the beginning of René Bazin's novel* in the Revue. Did you like the Vogüé {?}* It's as cold and grand as Chateaubriand* in my opinion. -- The unsigned verses were by Madame de Régnier,* the symbolist poet's wife, and the daughter of one of our famous poets, José-Maria de Hérédia{.}
Notes
1897: This date is supported by information in the notes below on Ferdinand Brunetière's American lecture tour and various publications by French authors. Mme. Blanc accompanied him on the Atlantic voyage.
M. B.: Ferdinand Brunetière (1849-1906),editor of Revue des Deux Mondes, who lectured successfully in the United States in 1897. Mme. Blanc accompanied him on the Atlantic voyage to the U.S. See the Catholic Encyclopedia.
Sarah: Sarah Orne Jewett. See Key to Correspondents.
Higginson: Almost certainly Thomas Wentworth Higginson. See Key to Correspondents.
your book: Fields's new book in early 1897 would have been Authors and Friends (1896).
Bazin's novel: René François Nicolas Marie Bazin (1853-1932). His De Toute Son Âme began serialization in Revue des Deux Mondes 139:2 (15 January 1897).
Vogüé: Eugène-Melchior de Vogüé (1848-1910). His Jean d’Agrève completed serialization of in the same 15 January 1897 issue of Revue.
Chateaubriand: French author and politician, François-René de Chateaubriand (1768-1848).
Vogüé: Eugène-Melchior de Vogüé (1848-1910). His Jean d’Agrève completed serialization of in the same 15 January 1897 issue of Revue.
de Régnier: French novelist and poet Marie de Régnier (1875-1963). She married the poet Henri de Régnier (1864-1836). Her father also was a poet, José-Maria de Heredia (1842-1905).
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Huntington Library, San Marino, CA, in the James T. Fields Papers and Addenda mss FI 1-5637, Box 5. Transcription, translation and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College, with essential assistance from Jeannine Hammond, Professor of French, Emerita, at Coe College.
Transcription
La Ferté St Jouarre
Chère Annie,
Je pense que M. B *
vous aura envoyé
le télégramme demandé.
Je lui ai tout de suite
envoyé le passage
de votre lettre intéressant
pour lui. Aussitôt il
m'a répondu, en me
chargeant pour vous
de ses remerciments les
plus empressés, mais
en ajoutant qu'il
se trouvait dans une
situation assez
délicate, ayant
refusé de parler
à Radcliffe à cause
des offres dérisoires
qui lui avaient été
faites. Son intention
était de n'aller à
Cambridge et à Boston
qu'en visiteur et
j'ai vu que son
idée était qu'il n'aurait
aucune chance
m'étonnant de son refus
et en le regrettant fort.
Je lui ai immédiatement
donné le conseil de
parler quand même et
d'autant plus dans un
milieu indépendant à Boston
où tout le monde viendrait
l'entendre. Je lui ai dit qu'il
attribuait à l'université des sentiments
qu'elle n'aurait jamais et que
si Radcliffe ne lui avait
pas offert davantage c'est
que probablement ce collège
naissant n'était pas riche
et ne pourrait mieux faire
Tout ceci, n'est-
ce pas absolument
entre nous, chère
Annie? -- J'ai ajouté
que Boston était
la ville où il serait
le mieux apprécié
où le Revue avait
le plus de lecteurs.
Bref j'espère qu'il
vous a envoyé un
oui, mais je suis
à la compagne, loin
de toutes les nouvelles
sous la neige.
De temps en temps je
vais à Paris pour
mes affaires et
les dîners que je
ne puis éviter.
La semaine prochaine
je verrai B .... -----
Ne viendrez-vous
pas avec Sarah
passer à Baltimore
le temps de mon
séjour? Ce serait
une telle fête!
Je vous embrasse
tendrement toutes
les deux. ThB
si vous voyez M Higginson
dites-lui que l'amie qu'il
m'a annoncée n'est jamais venue.
D'ailleurs je lui écrirai.
Votre livre m'a [ passionnément ? ]
intéresée.
Quelle délicieuse chose que le commencement
du roman de René Bazin dans la
revue. Avez-vous aimé le Vogüé {?}
C'est froid et grandiose comme du
Chateaubriand à mon avis. -- Les
vers non signés étaient de Mme de Régnier
la femme du poète symboliste, la fille d'un de nos poètes
célèbres, José-Maria de Hérédia{.}
Louise Imogen Guiney to Sarah Orne Jewett
After no end of delay, I have managed to send Mr. Warner* my little Keats paper, for his Library publication. I didn't like it at all, but he does; and I can't help feeling comforted. May I send you my Irish poet, (Clarence Mangan,)* when he shall show above ground? I have had the poor wight under my hand for some six years, and now he is in proof. My love to Mrs. Fields,* please, and loving thoughts . . if only they might 'stim'late!'
Notes
Warner ... Keats paper: Charles Dudley Warner. Key to Correspondents. His Library of the World's Best Literature (30 volumes) appeared over a number of years. It included Guiney's "Critical and Biographical Introduction" to British poet John Keats.
Clarence Mangan: Irish poet James Clarence Mangan (1803-1849). Guiney's 1897 book was James Clarence Mangan: His Selected Poems and a Study. Wikipedia.
Mass.: Penciled in another hand and in brackets at the bottom right of the page: [ Louise Imogen Guiney ].
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Miller Library, Special Collections, Colby College, Waterville, ME: JEWE.1. Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Sara Norton
[Boston, February 17, 1897]*
Yes, dear Sally: I shall be delighted to stay to luncheon with you on Friday.
S. O. J.
Wednesday morning -- in Great Haste!
Notes
1897: This date comes from the envelope accompanying the letter, addressed to Shady Hill. in Cambridge, MA, was the Norton family residence.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library, Harvard University. Norton Family, recipient. Letters Received by the Norton Family. 5 letters to Sara Norton; [1897-1908]. MS Am 1088.1 (870-874). Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College, with assistance from Tanner Brossart.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Mary Rice Jewett
[ Before 20 February 1897 ]
Dear Mary
I hope it went well yesterday about the Fair. Please put in ten dollars from me for your table, or buy something for Christmas with it. I had a nice time with the Club though it happened that only Katie & Martha Silsbee* & I could come, it being a short notice, so Mrs. Sears* asked another piece of a Club as it were of Mrs. Agassiz Mrs. Howe & S.W. most glorious to behold and we had great fun and Mrs. Howe was too dear and naughty and played and sang most beautiful to hear in the great music room. It was quite enchanting as you may suppose. I stopped to see Carrie on my way over there but she was out. I gave an offer to the tickets for Saturday’s concert to her & Mrs. Ridner but I haven’t heard yet.
Oh there are such lots of things to tell you and to talk about but not so much to write about. Some times I think some foolish written things may last as long as the pyramids! You never know in what shape, but there it is if you write it. I am afraid that idle words of mine will have to piled up in the moon on account of scant room any where else. I will now pass to the more important news of A.F.* who is about the same but very quiet and contented to stay in her room and not even asking to go down stairs. She complains of feeling so weak in spite of all her tonics. I dont know when she can get out at this rate to have the air again. I hope that I shall get home early today. Yesterday we had promised to go to Miss Cary’s (Mrs. Agassiz’s sister)* to hear some music, so I went alone or was going after the lunch was over but Mrs. Agassiz took me out with her which was lovely (we did have such a good time) but I didn’t get home until after dark after having gone out at one and it has happened once before this week and I dont like to be away in such a long piece, but it has happened that I got a good walk every day which is well. I must now close with much love. Please give my love to Becca.*
S.O.J.
I haven’t forgotten about your ‘undergarments’ of French design, but I haven’t been over into the streets since: They were giving them away both at Hoveys and Fords or Gross & (Stickney?) & other places earlier, and I am sure that there will be present opportunity.
Notes
Before 20 February 1897: This date is not
certain, but it seems likely. Jewett's reference to a fair
in South Berwick connects with a similar mention in her letter
to Mary of 20 February 1897. Also, Mrs. Fields is reported
to be confined at home by ill health in both letters. Her
reference to a offering tickets to a "concert" on Saturday do
not correspond exactly to the performance of a staged musical of
Alice in Wonderland that she attended on 20 February
1897, but it is not unreasonable to believe she might refer to
the musical as a concert. Of course, it is possible that
she refers here to a difference concert altogether, or that this
really is not the right date for this letter.
The first probably was the "It" Club. Shana McKenna, Archivist at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum says that the "It" club was a lunch club formed by Julia Ward Howe and Isabella Stewart Gardner. Its other members, in addition to Jewett, included:
Edith Greenough Wendell (1859-1938), author of Old Quincy House at Quincy, Massachusetts and wife of Barrett Wendell (1855-1921), Harvard English professor, lecturer and author.
Margaret Deland (1857-1945)
Katherine Parkman Coolidge (1858-1900). See Correspondents.
Sarah Choate Sears (1858-1935)
Alma Canfield Sterling Porter (1863- ), wife of Harvard Medical School professor William Townsend Porter (1862-1949).
Martha Silsbee (1859-1928)
The Gardner museum holds a guest book that documents a 12 February 1894 meeting at Gardner's home, 152 Beacon St., Boston. See Morris Carter, Isabella Stewart Gardner and Fenway Court, Houghton Mifflin, Boston, 1925. pp.141-2, and Isabella Stewart Gardner, Guest book vol. 1 (1893-1894), page 37-38.
It is possible that the second was the Emery Bag Club founded by Sarah Cabot Wheelwright. Jewett and Fields declined membership in the Boston Authors Club (founded in 1899, with Julia Ward Howe as a founding member) three times between 1899 and 1902.
Jewett almost certainly refers to the watercolor artist, Martha Silsbee (1858 or 1859 - 1928), who lived in Boston and was associated with the Dublin Art Colony in Dublin, NH. She was the daughter of the Salem, MA merchant John Boardman Silsbee (1813-1867) and Martha Mansfield Shepard (1828-1911), who shared a Boston house with her three unmarried children in the 1880s: Arthur Boardman Silsbee (a banker, shipping merchant, and textile mill executive), Martha Silsbee (an artist), and Thomas Silsbee. Martha's oldest sister was Emily Fairfax Silsbee Lawrence.
While Miss Katherine Silsbee also was a resident of Boston in the 1890s, I have been unable thus far to establish any connection between her and Martha Silsbee. The Silsbee family was extensive in Boston and in nearby Salem, so Katherine may be a cousin.
Mrs. Sears ... Mrs. Agassiz Mrs. Howe & S.W. : Mrs. Sears is likely to be Sarah Choate Sears (1858-1935), a member of the It Club and an influential Boston artist, patron and collector, the wife of Boston realtor J. Montgomery Sears. She was an award-winning artist who exhibited internationally, working in painting, photography, metals and textiles.
For Elizabeth Cabot Cary Agassiz, Julia Ward Howe (probably) and Sarah Wyman Whitman, see Key to Correspondents.
Carrie: Almost always this would be Carrie Jewett Eastman, but she would have to be in Boston at the same time as her sister is in this case. This is not impossible, but it casts some doubt on whether this reference is to her sister.
Mrs. Ridner: Mrs. Ridner has not been identified. It is at least remotely possible that she is Caroline Ridner (1812-1891), wife of John P. Ridner (1810-1873) of Brooklyn, NY. He is author of The Artist's Chromatic Handbook. Being a Practical Treatise on Pigments: Their Properties and Uses in Painting. To Which is Added, a Few Remarks on Vehicles and Varnishes. Chiefly a Compilation from the Best Authorities 1850. The American artist William Page (1811-1885) completed a portrait of Mrs. Ridner in about 1849. However, there is no evidence to support this possibility.Mrs. Fields: Annie Adams Fields. See Key to Correspondents.
Miss Cary’s (Mrs. Agassiz’s sister): Almost certainly this was Sarah Gray Cary (1830-1898), the sister of Elizabeth Cabot Cary Agassiz who did not marry.
Becca: Rebecca Young. See Key to Correspondents.
‘undergarments’ of French design ... into the streets since
... giving them away both at Hoveys and Fords or Gross &
(Stickney?): The transcription does not make clear
whether the parentheses and question mark represent the
transcriber's guess at a word, but this seems likely. C.
F. Hovey and Company was a dry goods store on Summer Street in
Boston, from 1848 until well into the 20th Century. Gross &
Strauss, also on Summer Street, specialized in laces and
embroideries, while Gross, Daniels & Co., sold dry goods.
John G. Ford sold ladies undergarments. To what particular
undergarments Jewett refers remains unknown.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Mary Rice Jewett
[ Saturday 20
February 1897]
Dear Mary
What a pretty day and I suppose that your labors with the fair are all over. I should think if the weather and the sleighing hold that you would feel your duty to lie before you toward Mis’ Leavitts* or somewhere far distant on a pleasant stretch of road!! I send you these lettys -- the New Jersey one was very interesting & belongs with the poem which I had acknowledged. Please put them on my desk. You neednt send them back here. Yesterday while I was still at my letters Carrie came inin [ so transcribed ] apparently spirits of delight having visited Jack and the Beanstalk* the night before. Laura Richards* came just afterward and I being still in my kimono array (a beautiful camels hair one having been given by Susan Travers and much beseemed by me!) had to fly and get dressed as I had promised to take Laura to the Montaigne class at Cambridge.* She had a great time, being fond of French and was going to luncheon further on. I do so wish I had taken you out with me, but they go on sometime yet. Mrs. S. D. Warren* goes, Mary, and is so pleasant!! but it is not half as big a class as I should think it would be, and it is pretty hard to be regular in winter weather. I went on up to Shady Hill* to luncheon and such a nice time and then scudded in to town under bare poles the wind blew so round corners, and just as I was stepping to the car my cape blew right over my head. Luckily it wasn’t cold, but it was borne in upon me that it was close to March. There is now Saturday before me to do, but nothing could begin pleasanter -- the ice is pretty well out of the river again. I am going to Alice in Wonderland with S.W.* We have waited with difficulty so many nights. It doesn’t begin until half past eight, so that I can go very well. Here’s William* who seems to come earlier and earlier, but the cloak remains the same.
I send the papers by express. If there ought to be any words Rebecca* can set them in.
With much love
Sarah
Mrs. Fields* is about the same as yesterday. I had her come down into the library at night and have her dinner which seemed a great treat, but she soon got tired & went p to bed. I think she felt better to think she could do it. She sends love.
Notes
Saturday 20 February 1897: A handwritten
note on this transcription reads: Feb. 1894? However, as
Jewett refers to her plan to attend a Saturday performance of Alice
and Wonderland, this letter almost certainly was composed
on the morning of that Saturday, or perhaps on the previous
evening.
fair: See the letter to Mary Jewett dated "Before
20 February 1897."
Carrie ... having visited Jack and the Beanstalk:
Carrie Jewett Eastman. See Key
to
Correspondents. In January of 1897 an "electric
ballet" of The Strange Adventures of Jack and the Beanstalk
opened at the Boston Museum. The "spectacular" production
is described in Chapter Six of Extravaganza King: Robert Barnet and Boston
Musical Theatre (2004) by Anne Alison Barnet.
Laura Richards: See Key to Correspondents.
Susan Travers: See Key to Correspondents.
the Montaigne class at Cambridge: This may have
been a course offered to Harvard and Radcliffe students in the
1890s by Ferdinand Bôcher, Harvard Professor of Modern
Languages, "Essays of Montaigne and their Influence on Later
Thought."
Mrs. S.D. Warren: Susan Cornelia Clarke Warren (1825-1901)
is remembered as a philanthropist and art collector,
specializing in porcelain and watercolor. Her husband Samuel Dennis Warren (1817-1888) was a
Boston paper manufacturer and founder of the Cumberland Paper Mills in Westbrook, ME.
going to Alice in Wonderland with S.W.: A stage musical adaptation of Lewis
Carroll's Alice in Wonderland was presented at Copley
Hall in Boston, February 17-20, 1897. The White Rabbit and
the Mouse were played by Joseph Lindon Smith: see Sarah Orne
Jewett to Joseph Lindon Smith of 26 February 1897.
S. W. is Sarah Wyman Whitman. See Key
to
Correspondents.
William: This William may be in the employ of
Annie Fields. He seems to collect and take away mail. More
information welcome
Rebecca: Probably Rebecca Young. See Key to Correspondents.
Mrs. Fields: Annie Adams Fields. See Key
to
Correspondents.
This text is from transcriptions from mixed repositories in the
Maine Women Writer's Collection, University of New England,
Letters from Sarah Orne Jewett, 1875-1890, Folder 73, Burton
Trafton Jewett Research Collection. For more information about
the individual transcription, contact the Maine Women Writers
Collection. Preparation by Linda Heller. Notes by
Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Joseph Lindon Smith*
26 February 1897
Dear Mr Smith
My friend Mrs. Almira Todd* of Dunnet
Landing Maine was in town last week and went with me to see
Alice in Wonderland.* She didn't know what Capn
Littlepage would think of it but it did seem like some of his
stories that he used to tell Johnny Bowden before he got to be
so old and all for boats and fishing. For her part she never saw
anything
that came up to that Rabbit! It behaved just as natural as could be and was so beautiful looking and pretty-behaved and the mouse had proper manners: = it reminded her of William and company lighting on him unexpected when anything was mentioned about the cat. Yes it was a proper mouse and she understood it was a gentleman that took the part and ^that^ I was acquainted with him so she begged me to
tell you that it was the prettiest time she ever had and she wished if the show was travelin' this summer it would take in the Landin! She would see to it that every body went, but perhaps they would do better to perform over to Port, but look out and pick for a full moon night, because You
never can rely on the folks from up country or the Back Shore in the dark of the moon.
Having discharged my mind of the
responsibility of these
messages! I must thank you on my own account for the
great pleasure of your note. I have been hoping that I might say
thank you instead of writing it. Please give my regards to Mrs.
Smith whom I enjoyed so much seeing last week
And believe me
S. O. Jewett.
Notes
Joseph Lindon Smith: Curators have mistakenly identified
the recipient of this letter as Francis Hopkinson Smith: See Key
to Correspondents. As the program for Alice in
Wonderland shows (see note below), Jewett is complimenting
Joseph Lindon Smith upon his performances.
Todd: Almira Todd is a principal character in
Jewett's The Country of the Pointed Firs (1896); other
characters Jewett mentions from the novel are Captain
Littlepage, Johnny Bowden, and William Blackett.
Alice in Wonderland: According to Harris
Broadside BDR:265054 in the Brown University Library Digital
Repository, a staged musical adaptation of Lewis Carroll's Alice
in Wonderland was presented at Copley Hall in Boston
during February of 1897. The White Rabbit and the Mouse
were played by Joseph Lindon Smith. See also Sarah Orne Jewett
to Mrs. Sarah Cabot Wheelwright of 5 August 1906.
This letter is held by Colby College Special
Collections, Waterville, Maine: JEWE.1. A transcription first
appeared in Scott Frederick Stoddart's Ph.D. dissertation at
the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign: Selected
Letters of Sarah Orne Jewett, copyright by Stoddart,
1988. New transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe
College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Julia Bacon*
Boston Wednesday
[ 3 March 1897 ]*
Dear Miss Bacon
Mrs. Fields* (who is ill) asks me to say that she is quite willing to have her name used as a Patroness of the Hundred Masterpieces Exhibition,* and she sends a cheque for the tickets with much pleasure{.}
Notes
3 March 1897: The month and day are a guess, this being the final Wednesday before the 5 March opening of the exhibition. It is likely the letter was composed at a somewhat earlier date. Annie Fields is known from letters of February 1897 to have been ill in the latter half of that month.
Bacon: This letter's recipient probably was the American painter, Julia Bacon (1861-1901). She was a member of the Boston Art Students Association, which organized the One Hundred Masterpieces Exhibition. She is listed as a member of the Committee on Social Arrangements in the exhibition catalog.
Mrs. Fields: Annie Adams Fields. See Key to Correspondents.
Hundred Masterpieces Exhibition: In March 1897 Boston's Copley Society of Art (then the Boston Art Students Association) held its first major exhibition, One Hundred Masterpieces, in the Grundmann Studio Building "with works on loan from the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston."
1897: It is not clear that this date is in Jewett's hand. The ink appears to be different from the rest of the letter.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the University of Wisconsin-Madison Libraries, Department of Rare Books and Special Collections; Cairns Collection of American Women Writers, Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Sarah Wyman Whitman
including a motto: NE CEDE MALIS ]*
Albemarle hotel
Madison Square, West
New York.
[ End letterhead ]
This letter you will see at once to be from a Duchess, it bears a noble crest or cornet or what ever a Duchess's letter should properly bear . . . . . I now thank a person to whom a Duchess is nothing, for the dearest of great long letters and say how glad I was to get it. This is Friday night and Masterpieces are to be [ splendidly ? ] attended. I think of you with dearest love and wistfulness . . what I
should like would be to read a nice book at 77* while you were gone and then when you came in to just wave a little wand and all your letters would be written and sealed and piled up ready for next morning's mail and then we could just sit up and tell about things as long as we liked but not longer, and I should say that A.F.* is really gaining and being so dear and contented; though she cannot get out she doesn't in the least wish to go out, so all is well and she finds the hotel comfortable as I do, and so all is content and going on properly. We are
to take the Sunday night train, and Mary* goes home that afternoon -- Yesterday she and I had a long drive which was a great pleasure to me -- and tea with the friend who sent us on the way home -- To-day Mary went far and wide and I ran up to a luncheon with Mrs. Hunt* according to a promise and Mary Porter was there and it was pretty nice, and I not being in a bit of hurry to come away, but did. Mrs Hunt is a very very dear and kind friend, I should like to say it to one who knows.
This corner is opposite to the establishment of Maillard.* You may have reflected upon so great
a truth, but if I were sitting there when you get home tonight it would be with all my chocolates and my [ boules-de-clear-caramels so it is written ] and my brandy drops and sugared almonds.
----- There is no Susan Travers* in all New York; she has gone to the Inauguration* and New York has the air of being out of season. When she comes back we shall go trading together at Maillard --
Yes dear it is all true about Alice Howe:* I think she has been quite gallant about this winter until now -- I'll tell you the best thing you could have done: it was to go there to dinner.
This is my love O. as children send a kiss in a letter. I send one
myself to you. And I love you and keep you safe in my heart just [ as blotted ] if you were the Spring. Which is not the flowers or the green leaves or the look of the sky but something warm that has a heart
continuing into the left and top margins of page 3 ]
-- Something that touches everything dull and makes it begin to bloom. I say this and could not say it if you were here and I wish I were with you for all that! Good night dear! S.O.J.
Notes
NE CEDE MALIS: Latin: yield not to misfortune.
In the spring of 1897, Jewett traveled with the ill Annie Fields to New York City and on to Hot Springs, VA.
Friday 5 March 1897: This date is supported by Jewett's reference to the inauguration of President McKinley. See notes below.
77: Whitman's residence at 77 Mount Vernon St., Boston.
A.F.: Annie Adams Fields. Key to Correspondents.
Mary: Mary Rice Jewett. Key to Correspondents.
Mrs. Hunt ... Mary Porter: Mrs. Hunt probably is Louise Dumaresq Perkins, widow of American painter, William Morris Hunt (1824-1879).
Mary Porter may be Mary Porter Gamewell (1848-1906), author of Mary Porter Gamewell and her Story of the Siege in Peking (1907). She seems to have been widely known by her maiden name, "Miss Mary Porter," even after her marriage in about 1883.
Maillard: Henry Maillard was a New York confectioner at 1097 Broadway.
Susan Travers: Key to Correspondents.
Inauguration: Almost certainly this is the inauguration of President William McKinley on Thursday 4 March 1897.
Alice Howe: Alice Greenwood Howe. Key to Correspondents.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University, Cambridge, MA. bMS Am 1743 Box 6, Item 277.
Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Lilian Woodman Aldrich
March 9th [ 1897 ]
My dear Lilian
I write to say that we came here from New York day before yesterday and have waited over one day to make a report based upon the experience. For a very expensive hotel* this is by all odds the least comfortable I ever saw unless it was the inn on the top of Mount Washington!* The rooms are not very nice (by this I mean ^not^ comfortable --
bathrooms & views but I haven't seen any -- not even Mrs [Pierpoint so it appears ] Morgans* where she has lived all winter -- that I have any warm admiration for. I dont believe you and T.B.* would like it any better than we do. Dining room affairs are ordinary as to cooking & service: not that I have not found myself in worse places but never at such cost. There some pleasant persons to keep company with but the great place is crowded full and I doubt if you could arrange to be any better off than we find ourselves. Dr. Brandt* seems a very nice
man. And I hope he will do A.F.* much good{.} She is still pretty weak and listless, and does not incline to much exertion, lies down most of the time &c -- She was much better in New York though she did not go out and did not seem to mind the journey here, though she has been very tired ever since.
We wish that we were at Kenilworth Inn* in North Carolina of which we only know pleasant things and perhaps we shall push on by and by, though after you once
get here all the railroads seem to conspire against your doing anything but go straight back to New York again. These are not glowing accounts of the Homestead hotel you will observe -- I can imagine it much nicer in December & January with the clear weather and few persons here. Now it is crowded and steamheated and -- stuffy. When a fellow thinks of the Ponce de Leon!* But A.F. needs this high air and I shall just make the best of it. We should be better off with your pleasant company but oh how T.B. & A.F. would [ unrecognized word wish ? ] for Robert Buchanan* if they read the
Victorian Anthology together now! We both send love and hope to hear from you if we dont see you. Write to the address of this yellow dragon on the paper.
S. O J.
. . / .*
Notes
1897: While there is independent confirmation that Jewett and Fields were at the Homestead Hotel in March of 1897, March 9 actually fell on a Tuesday that year.
However, Jewett wrote to Fields on 5 August 1886 about the possibility of visiting Hot Springs, VA, and March 9 did fall on Wednesday in 1887. And yet, Jewett had not yet seen the Ponce de Leon hotel in St. Augustine, FL in 1887.
expensive hotel: The Homestead Hotel, Hot Springs, VA, was a luxury resort in the Allegheny Mountains that first opened in 1766. It became a major destination in the 1880s after investors arranged to run a railroad spur to the location and built a new hotel.
Mount Washington: The highest peak and a popular destination in the White Mountains of New Hampshire.
Mrs ... Morgans: John Pierpont Morgan (1837-1913), was an enormously wealthy American financier and banker. His second wife was Frances Louisa Tracy (1842-1924).
T.B.: Thomas Bailey Aldrich. See Key to Correspondents.
Dr. Brandt: Dr. Brandt has not yet been identified.
A.F.: Annie Adams Fields. See Key to Correspondents.
Kenilworth Inn* in North Carolina: Then a luxury hotel in Asheville, NC.
Ponce de Leon: Jewett and Fields had enjoyed their stay in this newly constructed in St. Augustine, FL, during several winter trips beginning in 1888 and including 1896.
Robert Buchanan: In the winter and spring of 1896, the Aldriches, Jewett and Fields accompanied Henry Lille Pierce in a steam yacht cruise of the Caribbean. The journey was notable for bad weather, during which all suffered frequently with long bouts of sea-sickness, especially Lilian Aldrich. On this trip, Fields brought her copy of the newly published A Victorian Anthology, 1837-1895: Selections Illustrating the Editor's Critical Review of British Poetry in the Reign of Victoria by Edmund Clarence Stedman (Boston: Houghton, Mifflin, 1895). The anthology includes a generous selection (pp. 279-90) of poems by Scottish author, Robert Williams Buchanan (1841-1901). T. B. Aldrich was notoriously particular about diction and meter in his evaluations of poetry; he was not impressed with Buchanan.
[ marks ]: Whether the marks following Jewett's signature are significant is not yet known.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library, Harvard University, Cambridge, Mass. Thomas Bailey Aldrich Papers, 119 letters of Thomas Bailey and Lilian Woodman Aldrich, 1837-1926. MS Am 1429 (117). Transcribed and annotated by Terry Heller, Coe College.
At the bottom left of page one, in another hand, is a circled number: 2731.
Annie Adams Fields to Lilian Aldrich
The Homestead
Fred Sterry
Manager
Hot Springs, VA.
[ End letterhead ]
Homestead Hotel
Do not come here -- a crowded cheap hotel at high prices -- is
the truth -- a hilly country, good climate, kind people -- also the truth -- but there is no room to make anybody ^else^ comfortable, not even ^late comers like ourselves.^ We dream of our beautiful St. Augustine, but we remember we are here to get well of malaria and [ one or two unrecognized words ], and
really need treatment so we shall either stay here or go to North Carolina Hot Springs, if we cannot make ourselves contented here.
Sadie* sends you her dear love with mine. How glad we should be to have you here, you know! but I think you would not like it at all. There are very few, even decent rooms, and those are filled, and held at, for us, prohibitive prices, for even those ^rooms^ are really not worth paying for ----
Dear T.B. will think my note a disgrace to the family! Please burn it after reading our love out of it ----
And write us please if you have gone away from your own [ blessings ? ] and if so where!
your
Notes
Sadie: A nickname for Sarah Orne Jewett. See Key to Correspondents.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University: Thomas Bailey Aldrich Papers, MS Am 1429, Box 6, Items 1446-1538. Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Wyman Whitman to Sarah Orne Jewett
March 10, 1897.
I must have one word with those who
tarry in Virginia and see the Spring walking with visible sweet
feet over the edges of the Hills. . . . Here there is a sort of
molten condition which is perhaps the way it is going to be
always, and the more I endeavor to pull out of the hot, hopeless
sea of events, the more the whirlpools suck me down; and I am
about to make a cut clean across the face of human
relationships. But not till after the ----- have come for this
Sunday and perhaps ----- for the next and intermittent folks
appearing, reappearing, disappearing for the Masterpieces and
all the rest of it. I keep saying to myself, how good it was
that I once read a book, or learned a verse of poetry, because
now it's such a Big book I can't more than hold it --- this Book
of Life, and the Poem's got to be written not read.
Notes
This transcription appears in Letters, Sarah Wyman
Whitman. Cambridge, MA: Riverside Press, 1907,
"Letters to Sarah Orne Jewett: 1882-1903," pp. 61-109.
Theodore Frolinghuysen Wolfe* to Sarah Orne Jewett
NOTE: This is a pair of letters. Wolfe wrote to Jewett with questions. She made notes on his letter and then wrote a reply. His letter, then, consists of his text, with Jewett's notes rendered in dark blue.
College of Physicians and Surgeons.*
[ End letterhead ]
Dear Miss Jewett:
For a literary purpose, I entrust that you will answer a very few questions for me. I endeavor to minimize for you the trouble of replying by leaving space after each question for its answer, and by enclosing an addressed and stamped envelope. Please oblige me.
Is the "colonial house, ^built about 1760^ with old mahogany furnishings, huge tiled fireplaces, old silver, china and glass, and quaint pieces of bric-a-brac such as seafaring men of long ago collected" -- in which you are said to reside the house in which you were born?*
[ Page 2 ]
Yes. The photographer at South Berwick Maine can send you one.
Is it ^the residence^ properly in Berwick or South Berwick? [ Jewett has underlined South Berwick.]
Which room of the house is your study and workroom?
In the upper hall (which is large) I have done a great deal of writing at an old 'secretary'{.}
What are the principal books you have written in that house?
The greater portion of
Was Mrs. Thaxter often at your house? She speaks, in a letter, of your driving her into the woods to hear the hermit thrush.
Mrs Thaxter sometimes visited me, but we saw each other oftener in Boston in the winter [deleted letter ]{,}
Please do not think I trouble you too much. I did not intend to ask so many questions, and will be grateful if you will answer some.
Thanking you in advance for your kindness, I am
P.S. I direct return envelop to my country-place, Succasunna, N.J.* where I will await your reply.
16 March
Dear Doctor Wolfe,
I am sorry that I cannot give you a better address of the photographer at South Berwick than Photographic Rooms or of that sort but I do not remember the young man's name. I hope that I have answered your questions to your satisfaction{.}
S. O. Jewett
Notes
Theodore Frolinghuysen Wolfe: Bartleby.com says that Wolfe (1843/1847-1915) was: "An American physician and littérateur; born in New Jersey.... His books are: ‘A Literary Pilgrimage among the Haunts of Famous British Authors’; and ‘Literary Shrines: The Haunts of Famous American Authors.’ His professional writings include works on tetanus and anæsthesia." Literary Shrines appeared in 1896, before this letter, suggesting that he had it in mind to include an account of her home in another work. He does include the home of Annie Fields at 148 Charles St. in Boston.
Among his papers at Columbia University Libraries are notes he kept about Jewett.
At the time of this letter, Wolfe has retired from medicine to engage primarily in literary and ethnological pursuits. See also Archives and Special Collections, Columbia University Health Sciences Library.
College of Physicians and Surgeons: Wolfe earned his medical degree from the Columbia University (NY) College of Physicians and Surgeons. While it appears from this stationary that he continued an association with the college, the nature of that association has not yet been determined.
born: Wolfe refers to an interview essay on Jewett and her house, "Pleasant Day with Miss Jewett," which appeared in the Philadelphia Press on Sunday 18 August 1895.
The Story of the Normans: Jewett's popular history appeared in 1887.
A Country Doctor: Jewett's novel appeared in 1884.
Succasunna: Now a small, unincorporated town in northern New Jersey.
The manuscripts of these letters are held by the Columbia University (New York) Library in Special Collections, Jewett. Transcription from a microfilm copy and annotation by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Louisa Loring Dresel
The Homestead Hotel*
Hot Springs Va
[ March 1897 ]
Dear Loulie
I am sure you think that I have migrated with that bird, at whose Expression I laughed a good deal. I put him into my desk to keep him safe but I should quite like to see him again! -- I have been gone two weeks from Charles Street = the first, we spent in New York and my sister was with us and then we came here. Mrs. Fields* gained a good deal in New York and then lost it
through getting tired ^on the journey^ and not liking the place particularly well. I cant say that I care about it much yet. It is an expensive hotel with not much equivalent in the way of comfort -- but we have settled into two rooms which we like better than those we had at first and I have got my writing table going and Mrs. Fields has got hers and the door's open between us which is very comfy. Last night we had a little snow storm and we haven't been getting out
as much as one expects in Virginia.
-- There are some people here whom we like very much and we shall get on very well for a while.
-- I hope that your eyes are better and your knees? and that things are going well with you and Ellis,* and that you quieted down your gayeties properly when Lent* came in. You must [intended must not ?] if your eyes are still in trouble. I shall take no news for good news in every other respect. It is
good to see Mrs. Fields look a little more like herself than she did awhile ago but I wish she would get much stronger.
This is all I am going to write with so bad a pen but I have been feeling very remiss at having taken so young and beautiful a chicken and never saying that I thank you.
S. O. J.
With AF's love also to you & Ellis
Notes
March 1897: Blanchard in Sarah Orne Jewett says that Jewett and Fields traveled to Hot Springs, VA for Fields's health in February of 1897 (p. 305). In 1897, Lent began on 3 March.
Homestead Hotel, Hot Springs, Va: This luxury resort in the Allegheny Mountains first opened in 1766. It became a major destination in the 1880s after major investors arranged to run a railroad spur to the location and built a new hotel.
sister ... Mrs. Fields: Mary Rice Jewett and Annie Adams Fields (AF). See Key to Correspondents.
Ellis: For Ellis Dresel, see Louisa Loring Dresel in Key to Correspondents.
Lent: In the Christian liturgical calendar, Lent is a period of penance, lasting about 6 weeks, in preparation for the celebrating the resurrection of Christ at Easter.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Columbia University (New York) Library in Special Collections, Jewett. Transcription from a microfilm copy and annotation by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Mary Rice Jewett
[ March 14 or 21, 1897 ]
Dear Mary
I wonder every day now if it is as pleasant & springlike at home -- the buds are getting very big on the trees in sheltered places and the mountains look smoky & soft where the trees are coming out there too; all hard wood except some pines high up in the ravines. The little brooks are running as if they couldn’t get down hill fast enough, and almost all of them start right here at the “Soda Spring” or the Magnesia Spring* coming right out full grown from the side of the hill. We were out all the morning and took quite a good walk and A.F.* sat out on a piazza while I went to the bath. She is extremely personable in the New York cape which is very suitable for present wear. I think you will deem it becoming. --------------------------------------------------------------.
Affectionately
Sarah
Notes
The ellipsis indicates a partial transcription.
"Soda Spring” or the Magnesia Spring: These
names suggest that Jewett and Fields are staying at one of the
resorts in Hot Springs, VA, perhaps the Homestead or Barton
Lodge. Richard Cary places Jewett with Annie Fields in Hot
Springs, VA in March of 1897.
A.F.: Annie Adams Fields. See Key to Correspondents.
This text is from transcriptions from mixed repositories in the Maine Women Writer's Collection, University of New England, Letters from Sarah Orne Jewett, 1875-1890, Folder 73, Burton Trafton Jewett Research Collection. For more information about the individual transcription, contact the Maine Women Writers Collection. Preparation by Linda Heller. Notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.Sarah Orne Jewett to Mary Rice Jewett
Hot Springs* Wednesday
[ March 17, 1897 ]
Dear Mary
--------------- I some how thought that you would walk the piece on Sunday -- it felt like it here and I hope every thing will be coming up pretty. We ought to have a lovely garden this year with all the roots stronger and bigger. I do hope my poplars will do well, but if Nancy Brunefield* is true to her promises I may squeak out fifty cents for a new one in case any in the row should fail. I am glad you were going to Portsmouth and I shall hope Cousin Maria* will not put off her coming up even if it is a little later. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Notes
The hyphens at the beginning and end indicate this is an incomplete transcription.
Hot Springs: Richard Cary places Jewett with Annie
Fields in Hot Springs, VA in March of 1897.
Nancy Brunefield: In a letter of 29 August 1903, Jewett
reports on the growth of a row of poplar trees apparently on her
property in South Berwick. Nancy Brunefield, however,
remains unidentified.
Cousin Maria: In Sarah Orne Jewett, Blanchard
mentions a Cousin Maria (p. 36) as residing in Portsmouth,
NH. Probably this is Maria Parker Perry Robinson (1817-1912),
who is mentioned in other letters as the mother by her first
marriage of a childhood friend of Thomas Bailey Aldrich, Captain
William Gardner Shackford (1840-1907).
This text is from transcriptions from mixed repositories in the
Maine Women Writer's Collection, University of New England,
Letters from Sarah Orne Jewett, 1875-1890, Folder 74, Burton
Trafton Jewett Research Collection. For more information about
the individual transcription, contact the Maine Women Writers
Collection. Preparation by Linda Heller. Notes by
Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Carrie Jewett Eastman
[ 17 March 1897 ]*
Dear Carrie
I was much pleased with a long and sisterly letter from Exeter -- Perhaps Mary* will not have got home so I will direct this letter to you. I hope Mr. Stubbs* [ will corrected ] have nice time at home and proper weather. I saw two old robins yesterday and a dandelion as I wrote to Mary and we had a walk today and I took my bath but then it grew so cold that I haven't been out since. You must have had a very nice time with little Mary* and I can only be delighted
that Will came up to dinner and had a good time. I wish he would go down and see Cousin Maria* and inspect the quality of her doctoring. I felt quite worried by [ Jennson's ? ] letter and was glad that Mary didn't feel it was any more serious -- You and little Mary might have driven down! You could have taken a little ^extra^ time in connection with some afternoon drive.
Today besides being cold has now turned to rain -- it is just pelting down as fast as it can pour -- a real spring rain but the snow has quite gone off the
mountains. I went with friends yesterday to see a most lovely waterfall that pours down between two hills and it would have been a pleasant drive [ possibly deleted word ] but the clay roads are hard and rough just now. It will be much better here next month but I do think the hotel will crack and half the people spill and wash out if any more come. It is just as full as can be and all the cottages that stand along a little brook. I should like to be living in one but you have to come up to your meals and tonight for instance at dinner time it would be very trying. Mrs. Gilder* is
all ready to go, and has been [ passing ? ] part of the afternoon and [ gone corrected ] off now to say good bye & coming back here. I shall miss her so much.
Thérèse is on the deep in this moment and I hope that we shall get to Baltimore soon after she does which will be sometime next week. Give my love to Stubby and Becca. I am so glad Mary Woods is getting along nicely and you must remember me to Mary Ann -- Oh, Mary will have to let Richard Goodwin* know it is all right about the School honor. -- I hope it will be a season of plenty with the brook -- -- and thank him very much. With love
Notes
17 March 1897: An envelope associated with this letter is postmarked on this date in Hot Springs. Richard Cary places Jewett with Annie Fields in Hot Springs, VA in March of 1897.
Mary: Mary Rice Jewett. See Key to Correspondents. Though Jewett is reasonably careful about naming, still the number of Marys mentioned in this letter makes it difficult to be sure at any point to which Mary Jewett refers.
Mr. Stubbs: Theodore Jewett Eastman. Also called "Stubby" in this letter. See Key to Correspondents.
little Mary ... Will ... Cousin Maria ... Jennison: Little Mary has not been identified, but it is possible she is the youngest daughter of Alice Dunlap Gilman. See Key to Correspondents.
Will may be Jewett's uncle, Dr. William Perry, though she is not yet known to have called him "Will."
In Sarah Orne Jewett, Blanchard mentions a Cousin Maria (p. 36) as residing in Portsmouth, NH. Probably this is Maria Parker Perry Robinson (1817-1912), who is mentioned in other letters as the mother by her first marriage of a childhood friend of Thomas Bailey Aldrich, Captain William Gardner Shackford (1840-1907).
The transcription of Jennison is uncertain, and this person has not yet been identified.
Mrs. Gilder: Mrs. Gilder may be Helena de Kay, wife of Richard Watson Gilder. See Key to Correspondents.
Thérèse: Marie Thérèse de Solms Blanc. See Key to Correspondents.
Becca ... Mary Woods ... Mary Ann -- Richard Goodwin: Becca is Rebecca O. Young. See Key to Correspondents.
Mary Woods has not yet been identified. Residing in nearby Rollinsford, NH at this time was Mary L. Woods (1865-1937).
Mary Ann may be Mary Ann Boyd, who did house-cleaning for the Jewetts as indicated in other letters, but no further information about her has been discovered. There was a Boyd family in South Berwick, mentioned in Wendy Pirsig's The Placenames of South Berwick (2007), p. 212, but the identity of this person remains unknown.
Richard Goodwin's identity is uncertain, mainly because Goodwin was such a common name in South Berwick, ME. It is possible Jewett refers to Charles Richard Goodwin (1866-1937), or to his father, Richard Lord Goodwin (1836-1919), both of whom were contemporary residents of South Berwick.
The School honor also remains unexplained.
The manuscript of the letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University. Eastman, Caroline Augusta (Jewett) 1855-1897, recipient 4 letters; 1882-[1897] & [n.d.]. Jewett, Sarah Orne, 1849-1909. Sarah Orne Jewett correspondence, 1861-1930. MS Am 1743 (253). Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Horace E. Scudder
The Homestead Hotel
Hot Springs, Virginia
March 18, [1897 Thursday]
Dear Mr. Scudder:
I have just been reading a most
delightful short essay in the United Service Magazine for
January,1 a magazine which I never saw before, and it
seemed to me that I must write to you and Mr. Page2
and ask you to look out for the writer of "Society in
Washington," and some day give him a chance in our Atlantic.
I do not know him and I do not think that I ever read
anything of his before, but he says such first rate things in
this little paper and the 'atmosphere' is so fine. I believe
that he is the son in-law of Richard M. Hunt, but I do
not feel quite sure.3
Mrs. Fields and I had been talking
about M. Brunetière4 of the Revue des Deux Mondes
and his coming, and I was wishing that he would write an
essay on "The Canons of Literary Taste," but as I finished this
Washington paper I said to her that I should like to know what
Mr. Hunt would say on "A Standard of Manners." You see that I
expect great things from a writer whom I have met only once! But
Mr. Hunt says things on his fifth page that are very unusual,
and the value he puts upon American life and behavior in our
most cosmopolitan city is very discerning in its decisions.
You will be glad to know that Mrs. Fields5 is better after having more than one drawback on the road to health. She really begins to look like herself again. She would send you her very kind regards -- I am sure -- with mine.
Yours most truly,
Sarah O. Jewett
I am delighted to hear everyone who
speaks of the Atlantic say such good things!
NOTES
1 Livingston Hunt, "Society
in Washington," United Service, XVII (January 1897),
1-7.Miss Jewett erroneously refers to the United Service
Magazine; though both were journals of military and naval
affairs, the former was published in Philadelphia, the latter in
London.
2 Walter Hines Page
(1855-1918) was assistant editor of the Atlantic Monthly in
1896,editor
from
1898
to
1899,
and
wartime
United
States ambassador to Great Britain.
3 Miss Jewett inserted
"in-law" between lines and crossed out "but I do not feel quite
sure." Her confusion is understandable, for Livingston Hunt
(1859-1943), a naval officer, married another Hunt -- Catherine
Howland, daughter of Richard Morris Hunt, the American
architect.
4 Ferdinand Brunetière
(1849-1906), French critic who applied Darwin's theory of
evolution to literary history, was successively contributor,
secretary, sub-editor, and editor of the Revue des Deux
Mondes from 1877 to 1906. Invited to deliver a series of
lectures at Johns Hopkins and Harvard universities, Brunetière
arrived in the United States on March 21, 1897, accompanied
by
his
wife and Madame Blanc. On May 8 the Brunetières sailed for
France, leaving Madame Blanc here to visit with Miss Jewett,
Annie Fields and other American friends.
5 Jewett traveled with Annie
Fields to Virginia seeking a warmer climate for Mrs. Fields'
health.
This letter is edited and annotated by
Richard Cary in Sarah Orne Jewett Letters; the ms. is
held by Colby College Special Collections, Waterville, Maine.
Robert Collyer to Annie Adams Fields and Sarah Orne Jewett
Dear Lassies
I heard you had been here and had gone south so was bound to believe you had a good reason for not letting us know of your advent and exodus and am glad now to hear you are in clover touching tentative dandelions.
We are also well to do in weather. These are the days which bring dreams of spring. The willows are growing golden in the open spaces and will blossom I hope by Palm Sunday. I went to Baltimore a week ago to relieve Brother Weld* whose nerves needed to cool off -- [ hot bolt ? ] -- And last evening I gave Brother Brundage* a lift -- I hope -- in Albany preaching to a thousand Albany-ians and had to come home by the night train because a mother in [ am Isreal ? so it appears ] died on Saturday night so I am going to [ lounge ? ] after I see the family as I shall in a few minutes. No I cannot come to Virginia alas for the lack of the day for it would be pleasant to nestle down away from the clamor of New York.
We are wholly well. I have promised to preach in that Chapel at Manchester by the Sea early in August if you do not cross the sea and I guess I shall stay this side and have Brother Savage* go. Then I may make good a dream of taking the boat to Genoa the same as you did and getting round to England in the spring of '98. It is lovely to dream{,} almost as good as to do it and a great deal cheaper.
Robert Collyer
Notes
dandelions: Collyer omits many periods in this letter. I have supplied them wherever they seem necessary.
Brother Weld: American Unitarian minister, Charles Richmond Weld (1847-1918). See The Beacon, beginning in November and continuing through April 2014.
Brother Brundage: American Unitarian minister, William Milton Brundage (1857-1921).
Brother Savage: American Unitarian minister, Minot Judson Savage (1841-1918).
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Huntington Library, San Marino, CA, in the James T. Fields Papers and Addenda Box 10: mss Fl 1-5637. Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Sarah Wyman Whitman
March 25th
Dear S.W.
I write to say that the dandelions are snowed under and we are keeping warm with difficulty. A.F.* is better however and takes walks when I refuse to brave the outer air -- but I have not the heritage of determination that belongs to those who are Adamses and Mays.* I am already thinking of the hot bath at half past twelve o'clock tomorrow and [ dreading corrected ] the windy walk up the hill from the bath house which is always [ unrecognized word ]
like a tea kettle at the bottom of the valley.
Mrs Morgan* went off a week ago nearly in a private car and we miss her and her kindness very much, and all her flowers and talking of Coolidge* to one who so loves Coolidge as she does and should. Mrs. Gilder has gone too and there are no more gay occasions, and tea parties in her room and in Mrs, when her tea basket with two cups could never be found wanting any more than if it were a service of plate and the appliances of an old fashioned 'party' tea set. We had a very* nice time with Mrs. Gilder. I like her and her truthfulness and fun more and more -- and that nice mischievous way she has at unexpected moments.
So this has been a great pleasure and renewal of old days to A.F. and I liked Mrs. White straightaway -- and Mr. White a very charming and handsome gentleman had to go away to Washington so we spent most of our evenings together
[ Page 4 ]
and parted at last yesterday and almost with tears.
I bless hotels when I think they sometimes seem to give time, and not to steal it! ---- I speak in this letter only of our losses by evening trains but the morning trains bring an [ occasional corrected ] gain. We mean to leave on Sunday night (if the doctor will let me go then) and betake ourselves to the Mount Vernon Hotel in your native city -- on the fifth we are going to Mary Garretts with les Brunetieres and Thérèse!* They are there in Baltimore now and I [ wish corrected ] I could be there to see Madame Blanc -- for an hour --
While I am wishing things I think of the Studio. Oh no! It is a Thursday! but I can wish all the same and beckon you from the doorway -- -- I feel as if we had been gone very long -- I feel as if it were long to wait. Good bye darling -- I thank you
for your most dear letter and I send you my love. S. O. J.
With A.F.'s love to you
Notes
1897: Jewett and Fields stayed at Hot Springs, VA, in March of 1897. Associated with this letter is an envelope addressed to Whitman at 77 Mount Vernon St. in Boston, with a clear Boston cancellation on 26 March 1897.
A.F.: Annie Adams Fields. Key to Correspondents.
Adamses and Mays: Fields's ancestors, both prominent families of Boston.
Mrs. Morgan: John Pierpont Morgan (1837-1913), was an enormously wealthy American financier and banker. His second wife was Frances Louisa Tracy (1842-1924). Wikipedia.
Coolidge: Sarah Chauncey Woolsey. Key to Correspondents.
Mrs. Gilder: See Richard Watson Gilder in Key to Correspondents.
very: This word is underlined twice.
Mrs. White ... Mrs. Rutherford: These persons have not yet been identified.
and: In this letter, Jewett sometimes writes "a" with a long tail for "and." I render these as "and."
Mrs. Cotton Smith: This person has not yet been identified.
Mary Garretts with les Brunetieres and Thérèse: French author, Ferdinand Brunetière (1849-1906) was then editor of the Revue des Deux Mondes.
For Mary Elizabeth Garrett and Marie Thérèse de Solms Blanc see Key to Correspondents.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University, Cambridge, MA. bMS Am 1743 Box 6, Item 277.
Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
1 April 1897
Death of Carolyn (Carrie) Augusta Jewett Eastman
after surgery for an abdominal abscess.
(Born 13 December 1855)
She was Sarah's younger sister,
wife of Edwin C. Eastman (1849-1892), and
mother of Theodore Eastman (1879-1931)
Sarah Wyman Whitman to Sarah Orne Jewett
[ 1 April 1897 ]*
O my darling, there came at breakfast your message of last night: it made my heart stand still for a moment -- & continue to ache till better news comes. I must believe it will come. & my stout Paul* is standing by you at this moment of stress and that apprehension which is like no other apprehension.
I have telegraph for news and now just write this to go & touch your hand & put mine in it, and bless you all this day.
1 April 1897: This date, in another hand, is penciled in the upper right of this page. Almost surely, this letter was composed on the morning of 1 April.
This letter is somewhat problematic because the envelope associated with it in the Houghton file must not be the right one. Cancelled at 10 a.m. on 3 April 1897, it surely was mailed after Whitman would have learned of Carrie Eastman's death late on 1 April. That envelope probably belongs with the letter that follows it in the Houghton file.
Paul: Presumably, Whitman refers to St. Paul, perhaps 1 Corinthians 15 in the Bible.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University. Whitman, Sarah (Wyman) 1842-1904. 92 letters; [1884]-[1903] & [n.d.] Jewett, Sarah Orne, 1849-1909. Sarah Orne Jewett additional correspondence, 1868-1930. MS Am 1743.1 -107. Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Wyman Whitman to Sarah Orne Jewett
My darling I was indeed glad to get your letter & to know more: even if that left still so much time to be waited through. And I am helped to believe all good results by hearing of those Doctors in charge -- & your [ unrecognized words affectionate tears ? ]. Dr Fitz*
[ Page 2 ]
[ Also ? ] well, I think you will [ unrecognized words be finding ? ] tonight that one more day has passed, & if your sister is holding her own then it will be so much on the winning side.
I am going along and doing a million things, but there's not one which would [ unrecognized words hinder my coming ?] to you any minute, [ unrecognized words if so be that ?]
[ Page 3 ]
you could find [ unrecognized word me ?
] the least little bit of [ unrecognized word
service ? ]. So you will know this darling: and God
bless you and yours.
Notes
Penciled in the upper right corner of page 1 in another hand: ( 1 April 1897). This is the death date of Jewett's younger sister, Carrie Jewett Eastman. The associated envelope is addressed to Jewett in South Berwick, ME, and postmarked 9 p.m. on 1 April 1897.
Dr. Fitz: Robert Mainfort and Mary Kwas (University of Arkansas) believe this probably is Dr. Reginald Heber Fitz (1843-1913), a prominent Massachusetts physician, a professor of Medicine at Harvard University, and a practicing specialist in appendicitis.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University. Whitman, Sarah (Wyman) 1842-1904. 92 letters; [1884]-[1903] & [n.d.] Jewett, Sarah Orne, 1849-1909. Sarah Orne Jewett additional correspondence, 1868-1930. MS Am 1743.1 -107. Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Sarah Wyman Whitman
[ 1 April 1897 ]*
My Dear Friend
This evening my sister* died -- it seems already long ago. Theodore has been such a comfort in spite of his boyishness and his awful sorrow. I dont know what we could have done without him! He hoped to see you last week to tell you that he was to be confirmed last Sunday but he only went to town on
Saturday ^having been ill^ and was sent for again on Monday. I wish you would send him one word for himself dear -- that would be doing so much for me. When I think of the new problems and responsibilities that this loss brings, I do not know what to do. But I lived a great while in that long day of trains
and hurry, on Monday trying to get home. My poor sister Mary is almost broken hearted because being eight years older, and my mother always an invalid, she was like a little foster-mother to Carrie, and the dear [ relation corrected ] has never changed. I am afraid I never was half to either of them that they were to each other, and then I have been away so much -- It seems
as if I were the one who [ deletion ] could have been better spared, of us three sisters -- Alas -- Alas! ------ I do hope that I can keep A.F.* from
Notes
sister: Caroline Jewett Eastman died on 1 April 1897, leaving her orphaned son, Theodore, in the care of her older sisters, Mary Rice and Sarah Orne Jewett.
A.F.: Annie Adams Fields. Key to Correspondents.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University, Cambridge, MA. bMS Am 1743 Box 6, Item 277.
Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Wyman Whitman to Sarah Orne Jewett
O my friend, this is hard indeed to bear -- and my heart aches with all your hearts in this deep loss and pain. How to comfort each other: --- but this God Knows, and will make plain -- and we who love you so much must wait for the coming of his consolation. I bless Him that you were there: sustaining and helping all, and going down with your dear sister so far as the edge of that wonderful river -- that sea of life. Ah, [ deleted word ] across its wave how many have come
[ Page 2 ]
Darling, you will tell me what I can do for you. If presently you would like me to come down -- if there are things here. A.F.* is [ wishing ? ] thoughts all the time -- it is hard for her, and no one can do anything.
I hold you very close and love you.
Notes
2 April 1897: Almost certainly, Whitman wrote this letter on Friday 2 April, the day following the death of Jewett's younger sister, Carrie Eastman, the evening of 1 April 1897.
A. F.: Annie Adams Fields. See Key to Correspondents.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University. Whitman, Sarah (Wyman) 1842-1904. 92 letters; [1884]-[1903] & [n.d.] Jewett, Sarah Orne, 1849-1909. Sarah Orne Jewett additional correspondence, 1868-1930. MS Am 1743.1 -107. Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Transcription from Letters of Sarah Wyman Whitman (1907).
Part of this letter appears on pp.
92-3.
O my friend, this is hard indeed to bear, and my heart aches with all your hearts in this deep loss and pain! How to comfort each other --- but this God knows and will make plain, and we who love you so much must wait for the coming of this consolation. I bless Him that you were there, sustaining and helping all, and going down with your dear sister so far as the edge of that wonderful river -- that sea of life. Ah, across its wave how many have come into port and are in that perfect felicity towards which we yearn.
Amanda M. McIntire to Sarah Orne Jewett
Dear Miss Jewett
[ Let ? ] the rose tell of our love and sympathy to you.
On the back side of this folded note appears: Miss S O Jewett. Presumably the note accompanied the delivered gift of a flower. Amanda McIntire (1849-1915) and her husband, John (1847-1904), provided funeral services in South Berwick, ME, during Jewett's life.
The Houghton catalog entry speculates that this note is from 1882, but it is more likely to be from 1891 when Jewett's mother died, or 1897, when her sister, Carrie, died. Jewett was overseas when Carrie's husband, Edwin Eastman, died in 1892.
I have placed it in 1897, but it may well be from 1891.
See Pirsig, The Placenames of South Berwick, p. 112.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University, Cambridge, MA. bMS Am 1743 Box 3, Item 143 I. Letters to Sarah Orne Jewett.
Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Mary Rice Jewett
Saturday morning
[ 3 April 1897 ]*
Dear Mary
I send you the materials for Miss Chases behoff* -- and I hope you will like them. I am going to have her make me an India silk skirt which can be worn to mill and to meeting as Jennie S. says. I wonder if Miss E. Warren could do it -- but how nice if she could come & sew (on waists & things). If you havent done or seen, about her perhaps you could have her week after next. I am setting upon the 10th to go home or 11th as near as I can tell. You can take this bundle for an Easter present!* I feel like Grandpa who had begun too late to hear of keeping Christmas in Massachusetts.* I think I began too late about Easter the only times I have much deep association with are those young days when Georgie & I used to go to Trinity.* I meant to write her a letter to get tomorrow, but I must now write it tomorrow. I am still hoping that you may fetch a compass & come up. -- -- -- -- -- --
Notes
3 April 1897: This speculative date is
based upon the fact that Jewett writes about hiring seamstress
work from a Miss Chase. This person also is mentioned in a
letter of 17 January 1898. Easter in 1897 fell on 18 April.
It appears, therefore, that by 1898, the
Jewett sisters were having some of their sewing done by a Miss
Chase, instead of by their elderly, long-time local seamstress,
Olive Grant. Though it is possible this letter also is
from 1898, that is unlikely, because that year Jewett left for
Europe close to Easter (11 April). Other years after 1897 are
similarly problematic.
The dashes at the end
indicate this is an incomplete transcription.
Miss Chases behoff: Except that she seems to be a
seamstress, Miss Chase has not yet been identified. The use of
the term "behoff" is odd for Jewett. It is a legal term
(more often spelled "behof"), meaning for someone's use or
advantage.
Jennie S. ... Miss E. Warren: The identities of Jennie
S. and E. Warren are not yet known. It appears that among
the employees in Carrie Jewett Eastman's household during the
1890s was a woman named Jennie, who is mentioned in other
letters. However, it seems likely this letter was composed
after sister Carrie's death.
Grandpa ... Christmas: Dr. William Perry (See Key
to Correspondents) apparently was among those conservative
New Englanders who resisted turning Christmas into a
semi-secular holiday. See the 19th-century history of the
holiday in Wikipedia.
Georgie ... Trinity: Georgina Halliburton and Jewett sometimes attended Trinity Church (Episcopal) together when Jewett was in Boston. See Key to Correspondents.
This text is from transcriptions from mixed repositories in the Maine Women Writer's Collection, University of New England, Letters from Sarah Orne Jewett, 1875-1890, Folder 74, Burton Trafton Jewett Research Collection. For more information about the individual transcription, contact the Maine Women Writers Collection. Preparation by Linda Heller. Notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.Sarah Chauncey Woolsey to Sarah Orne Jewett
1897*
with a small drawing of an arm lifted above water grasping what appears to be a bone. ]
93, RHODE ISLAND AVENUE,
NEWPORT.
[ End letterhead ]
Oh -- how I wish this hard thing need not have been. My sweet Sarah -- how can I help or comfort you? only
by loving you more and more, and that I will do. -- The [ world gives only ? ] [ unrecognized word ] of our early loves and hopes -- [ and or our ?] heart aches deeper -- And all we can do is to live [ bravely on through ? ] the [ weary ? ] time of waiting and think at times how sweet the [ deletion ? ] [ next world ? ] will be where we shall have them all back again. God bless you dear friend and make you strong. Our love to Mary and dear Theodore --
Coolidge
Saturday.
April 4
Notes
1897: This letter responds to news of the death of Carrie Jewett Eastman on 1 April 1897 (Key to Correspondents). Associated with this letter is an envelope addressed to Jewett in South Berwick, canceled 3 April 1897. In this letter, Woolsey indicates that she had sent Jewett a note just before learning of Carrie Eastman's death. It would seem that this envelope either belongs to that note or that Woolsey has mistaken the date in her letter.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University, Cambridge, MA. bMS Am 1743 Box 5, Item 244.
Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Wyman Whitman to Sarah Orne Jewett
April 5, 1897.
This is just a little letter .
. . for this day of peace, when grief had in it no sort of
bitterness, and when all the sweetness and goodness of noble
living in its generations* seemed to glorify the day and mingle
with the spring which hung along the watercourses and in the
wide air. It helped and consoled me to be there. . . . These
messengers of death do indeed come thick and fast to us now, but
one finds a voice full of life which sings above the flowers. .
. . I ask a blessing for you every day.
Note
This transcription appears in Letters, Sarah Wyman
Whitman. Cambridge, MA: Riverside Press, 1907,
"Letters to Sarah Orne Jewett: 1882-1903," pp. 61-109.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Lilian Woodman Aldrich
[ 7 April 1897 ]*
Dear Lilian
Thank you so much for your kindest notes and messages. I meant to thank you for the last asking if you should come, but in the hurry and strangeness of Saturday I forgot it. The only trouble was that there was so little to do in those long days, and I was so
tired and sleepless day after day that I got to feeling dull and anxious about I know not what, [ deleted letter ] other than feeling any clear sense of the loss and change. My sister's death* is a great trial to us with all the new responsibilities that it brings -- but all this you know about and understand.
Theodore* went back to school this morning, and I was glad to have him go though I miss him. What a comfort to have him such a friend and helper, young as he is, instead of wilful and impatient of other people's ideas. You know the comfort of good boys!*
A. F.* has gone home today; a friend was
coming tomorrow. Miss Maitland* -- and so she will have to be on hand. I look forward so much to seeing you and dear T.B.* Do keep from getting ill in this spring weather!
With love and thanks from Mary* and me
S. O. J.
Notes
7 April 1897: While the day is not certain, this is the first Wednesday after the death of Caroline Jewett Eastman. Perhaps it was sent another week later on 14 April.
sister's death: Jewett's younger sister, Caroline Jewett Eastman, died on 1 April 1897.
Theodore: Nephew, Theodore Jewett Eastman. See Key to Correspondents. According to Paula Blanchard, Sarah Orne Jewett (2002) p. 305, in 1896 Theodore transferred from the Berwick Academy to the Noble and Greenough School in Dedham, MA, which is south of Boston, to prepare himself for Harvard University.
good boys: The Aldriches' twin sons, Talbot and Charles were born in 1868.
A.F.: Annie Adams Fields. See Key to Correspondents.
Miss Maitland: Presumably, this is Fields's friend, the British educator, Agnes Catherine Maitland (1850-1906), who was the principal of Somerville College, Oxford, England (1889-1906).
T.B.: Thomas Bailey Aldrich. See Key to Correspondents.
Mary: Mary Rice Jewett. See Key to Correspondents.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library, Harvard University, Cambridge, Mass. Thomas Baily Aldrich Papers, 119 letters of Thomas Bailey and Lilian Woodman Aldrich, 1837-1926. MS Am 1429 (117). Transcribed and annotated by Terry Heller, Coe College.
At the bottom left of page one, in another hand, is a circled number: 2715.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Louisa Loring Dresel Sunday [After 1
April 1897]1
South Berwick
Dear Loulie
Thank you for your note of yesterday, I am not going to say no
-- but I cannot say say [ so transcribed ] yes
until I get to town for I am not certain about my time. My
sister and Theodore are going with me and I shall have to suit
my plans a little to theirs. But I certainly will come to
luncheon if I possibly can. I don't get to town until Tuesday
night and I must get home on Friday. If I cant come to luncheon
I shall save a good bit of the afternoon for us -- I have
thought about you often dear this week
dear Loulie and wished to write but I have had a hard pull with
some work that I had to finish -- poor eyes and all!
Do you remember that I have your "note' book"
still? I have not read it yet -- I have done so little reading,
but I shall honestly bring it back to you now and "borry' it
again --
Yours lovingly always.
S. O. J.
Stoddart's Notes
1 The Colby curators date this letter "1889-99," As
it is written on black bordered stationary, it likely dates from
soon after 1 April 1897, when Jewett's younger sister, Caroline
Jewett Eastman, died.*
Editor's Notes
1897 ... died: Paula Blanchard says
that Jewett received eye treatments from Dr. Ella Dexter in the
autumn of 1893. In many of her letters during the spring
of 1893, Jewett complains of problems with her eyes.
Stoddart's speculation that the stationary suggests an 1897 date
makes sense, but the report on her eyes suggests the spring of
1893 as an alternate date.
South Berwick Maine
April 14th
[ 1897 ]*
Dear Mr. Garrison
I find this letter, too long neglected, which has been lying on my desk, and I am going to ask you to take whatever steps you think proper with Mr. Mifflin* -- in regard to it. I have been hearing a good deal from the book ^in England^ of late and the first small edition may have made way for another.
So that I am quite willing to have the extra copies sent over: as for the advertising I am inclined to venture the sum of five pounds it you think that would be worth while. This is funny and small business between the Pointed Firs* and the London market! but I suppose it is wise to follow out Mr. Unwin's plans.* Will you in sending
the books let him draw upon you for me for the five pounds -- always provided that you & Mr. Mifflin see no hindrance in the way? I suppose that the books Mr. Unwin ordered must have already gone.
-- I have had a very sad loss in the death of my younger sister Mrs. Eastman and since my sudden return
from the South I have been ill. These are very dark Spring days to me, and I have put everything by, else this letter would have been attended to in season.
Please to give my kind love to Mrs. Garrison
Sarah O. Jewett
Notes
1897: This date is confirmed by Jewett mentioning the death of her sister, Carrie Jewett Eastman, which took place on 1 April 1897. See Key to Correspondents.
Page 1 has two holes punched in the right margin, also making two holes in the left margin of page 3 on the back of the folded sheet.
At the bottom left of page 4 appear the initials: F.J.G, for Francis Jackson Garrison.
Mr. Mifflin: George Harrison Mifflin. See Key to Correspondents.
Pointed Firs: Jewett's 1896 novel, The Country of the Pointed Firs.
Mr. Unwin's: Thomas Fisher Unwin (1848-1935) was the founder of the British publishing house bearing his name. WorldCat lists a T. F. Unwin edition of The Country of the Pointed Firs (Cambridge and London) in 1896. Jewett's letter seems to indicate that Riverside Press provided at least some of the copies that Unwin sold in England.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University in Houghton Mifflin Company correspondence and records, 1832-1944, Jewett, Sarah Orne, 1849-1909. 68 letters from; 1870-1907 and [n.d.]. MS Am 1925 (962). Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Annie Adams Fields to Sarah Orne Jewett
My darling: I send with this a little copy of verses which I am going to ask you to take a quiet half hour for sometime and to see if there is anything in them -- Pinny* put me up to the idea! -- Please be frank about them --
This is a glorious day here -- Indeed of late we have had wondrous days -- Are you at York
I wonder or do you not get there until tomorrow -- The Woolseys* are more than kind and sweet and so companionable that we are getting on heartfully and I shall miss them! They had a good day yesterday -- We had a delightful visit at the Danas,* the children were exquisite --
then we came back and walked on the beach after Sunset. The sea was like opal.
They enjoyed the luncheon at Mrs Whitman's* very much -- Minnie Pratt and Mrs Frank Brooks were there -- no one else. Today they have gone to church and I am writing you --
I feel poor Carrie* hanging like a sad
weight upon you all. Pray tell me what is to be done --
By the way Coolidge said today "Sarah is quite right, H. & M. have no talent at advertising" and then she read
asked this earlier and I dare say you had
good reason -- but we shall see -- What
do you think of changing it now and putting
in other extracts. At any rate I am glad we
are trying the experiment* -- Your A.F.
Notes
1897: This date is supported by Fields's references to the death of Carrie Eastman and Jewett's experiment in advertising The Country of the Pointed Firs. However there is a complication. See notes below.
Pinny: Nickname for Jewett.
Woolseys: Sarah Chauncey Woolsey and her sister, Dora. Woolsey published under the name Susan Coolidge, and her friends usually referred to her as Coolidge. Key to Correspondents.
Danas: The family of Richard Henry Dana III. Key to Correspondents. The complication about dating the letter results from Fields describing the Dana children. She says almost exactly the same thing in a letter to Jewett in June 1887. Then the Dana children were under 10 years old. In 1897, they would be 19 and younger.
Whitman's ...Minnie Pratt and Mrs Frank Brooks: Sarah Wyman Whitman and Miriam Choate Pratt (sister of Helen Choate Bell). Key to Correspondents.
Mrs. Brooks has not yet been identified.
Carrie: Carrie Jewett Eastman, Jewett's younger sister. Fields's expression of concern suggests that she refers to Carrie Eastman's death on 1 April 1897.
experiment: In April 1897, Jewett arranged to invest some of own money in advertising her current book, The Country of the Pointed Firs. See Jewett to Francis Jackson Garrison of 14 April 1897.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University, Cambridge, MA. Sarah Orne Jewett Additional Correspondence, 100 letters from Annie Adams Fields, bMS Am 1743.1 Box 1, Item 33.
Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Wyman Whitman to Sarah Orne Jewett
April 16, 1897.
You will find that open door this
Easter which no one can shut.
Note
This transcription appears in Letters, Sarah Wyman
Whitman. Cambridge, MA: Riverside Press, 1907,
"Letters to Sarah Orne Jewett: 1882-1903," pp. 61-109.
Mary Abbott Gorham Sawyer to Sarah Orne Jewett
It singeth low in every heart*
We hear it each and all.
A song of those who answer not
However we may call.
They throng the silence of the breast.
We see them as of yore
The kind, the brave, the true, the sweet
Who walk with us no more.
Tis hard to take the burden up,
When these have laid it down.
They brightened all the joys of life
They softened every frown.
But, oh, 'tis good to think of them
When we are troubled sore!
Thanks be to God that such have been --
Although they are no more!
More home-like seems the vast unknown,
Since they have entered there{;}
To follow them were not so hard,
Wherever they may fare;
They cannot be where God is not,
On any sea or shore;
Whate’er betides, thy love abides,
Our God -- forever more.
I send you my dear friend these words for Easter that I doubt not are familiar to you -- but which I love so much & so often say to myself, and they seem so like the [ dear corrected ] child* -- who has gone to the vast unknown " which* seems so much more homelike where there are so many there who we feel that we can hardly live without. I had* expected to have sent you some
lilies to put at her feet, & some for my dear boy* at Exeter, but I have just come home -- & have been disappointed over them -- but you will know what I wanted to do -- Your letter has just come --
You don't know what a loss she is to me -- or how much I think of you all -- and of her, dear child.
I am so glad of
that lovely day last summer -- [ a mark in superscript position before the next word ] On that Monday I felt that I was [ almost ? ] with you -- Thank Theodore* for sending me the paper.
Do forgive me that I have said so much with the tears running down my cheeks --, but your letter is so dear, that I couldn't help it.
M. AGS
Give my dearest love to Mary* [ up the right margin ] & Theodore
Notes
1897: This date has been added in pencil, perhaps by another hand. 16 April fell on a Friday and Easter was on 18 April in 1897.
heart: "Auld Lang Syne" by American poet and Unitarian clergyman, John White Chadwick (1840–1904). Sawyer's text varies in a few details from that in The Poets of Transcendentalism: An Anthology, edited by George Willis Cooke. Wikipedia.
child: Sawyer refers to Jewett's sister, Carrie Jewett Eastman, who died on 1 April 1897. Key to Correspondents.
which: The quotation mark before this word stands alone.
had: This word may be deleted.
dear boy: Sawyer's son, William Gorham Sawyer (1860-1876) died and was buried in Exeter, NH.
Theodore: Theodore Jewett Eastman. Key to Correspondents.
Mary: Mary Rice Jewett. Key to Correspondents.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University, Cambridge, MA. Sarah Orne Jewett Correspondence, bMS Am 1743 Box 4, Item 190. I. Letters to Sarah Orne Jewett.
Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Charles Dudley Warner to Sarah Orne Jewett
I mail today the Adams book.* I never sent it before because I expected to carry it to you any time. It was all the time much safer than any living Adams, in the book case in my study.
Yesterday I returned from Mexico and 10 days in New Orleans, seeing the Kings,* speaking at [ Unrecognized name ], making a Prison address, to organize a Reform Association, and
being excited about the floods. [ Unrecognized word ]; was nothing to it, as to destruction of cotton and [ unrecognized word ].
The Kings send much love to you and Madam Blanc.*
And what is this I hear, that you are not well! I hope there is nothing in it. Our love to dear [ Sara ? ] in her grief.*
And can you find out
when it is going to suit Madam Blanc to give us the promised visit. And cannot you come at the same time? Mrs Warner will write, if you can give us any idea of your plans. Miss Agnes Maitland* is in New York and we expect a visit from her.
I am likely to be in New York all next week, about the Library.*
Chas. Dudley Warner
Notes
Adams book: It is not yet known to which book Warner refers.
As is evident in the many unrecognized words, Warner's handwriting is quite challenging. Many of the words I believe I recognize are guesswork. Anyone working with this material should examine the manuscript.
Kings: Family of Grace King. Key to Correspondents.
floods: Wikipedia lists a major Mississippi River flood in April and May of 1897.
Blanc: Marie Thérèse de Solms Blanc. Key to Correspondents.
Sara ... grief: It is not yet known to which "Sara" Warner refers. At this time, Jewett herself was mourning the recent death of her sister Carrie Eastman on 1 April 1897.
Agnes Maitland: Educator Agnes Catherine Maitland (1850-1906) was principal of Someville College, Oxford, UK.
Library: One of Warner's projects was the massive, Library of the World's Best Literature (1897).
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University, Cambridge, MA. bMS Am 1743 Box 5, Item 230.
Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Elizabeth Cary Agassiz to Sarah Orne Jewett
36 Quincy St
April 12th / 97
Dearest Sarah
I send you a [ morsel ? ] of loving greeting by Mrs Fields* but you are in my thoughts and I follow the impulse to tell you how much I care for you in these sad days* when your [ old ? ] home must seem very bereft = I have never been there but I find myself feeling rather at home in my [ mental ? ] picture of it; because I and mine had also an old home which was once called "the retreat"
Your ^old home^ had [ remained ? ] I know rural & sweet and home like, with a touch of the past [ binding ? ] generations & memories together{.} [ deletion ] But though mine is lost to me you will understand I think why it gives me the key to yours and makes me almost feel as if I had been there. I have
been led on to both of my [ other ? ] memories imperceptibly, but I only meant to tell you how grieved I am for the trouble that has fallen upon your homestead.
Such sorrows should bring people very near each other since they are shared by all but I hardly [ know ?] how it is that the words do not come which would at such times fitly express the thought --, -- sometimes silence seems better --
Good-bye dear with [ love ? ] and sympathy from your old friend
Notes
Fields: Annie Adams Fields. Key to Correspondents.
sad days: Jewett's sister, Caroline Eastman, died on 1 April 1897.
Agassiz: Agassiz may have abbreviated and underlined "Elizabeth."
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University, Cambridge, MA. bMS Am 1743.1 (01) Box 1, 3. Letters to Sarah Orne Jewett.
Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Chauncey Woolsey to Sarah Orne Jewett
[ 18 April 1897 ]*
My darling Sarah
I was so happy at your note and the sense of nearness which it brought. When a great change and [ sorrow ? ] comes to those we love, a veil seems to drop down and hide them from our sight. Grief affects human souls so differently -- hardening some -- embittering some, isolating some, making others only more dear and sweet and close. We can never know how it is going to influence the people we care for -- and we sit, as it were, on the outside of [ the ? ] mystery, and listen and yearn for a [ word ? ] from the inside. So to hear your dear voice again was very comforting, and I can think of you and
Mary on this beautiful [ morning ? ] as [ unrecognized word ] in something of the sweetness and comfort of the mental sunshine and the immortal hope. Easter grows more full of meaning as the [ time grows on? ] and makes life here seem so much less, and life in Heaven seems so much more. I am sure that none of the beloved people who have taken that [ last ? ] swift step out of our [ shadows ? ] into the light want to come back, but they must want [ very much ? ] to have us come to them there, only they wait patiently because they know more and have got to the full sense of the relations of things, of the trifles which seem to us so
vital, the delays which are to us so unbearably large, but in their light but as yesterday when it is past: the pain is hard for us to bear, but which [ viewed ? ] in the light of the everlasting knowledge is indeed of small account.
Darling, I know you are being brave, and sweet and selfless you will always be, and there is [ unrecognized word ] and happiness always somewhere for the true of heart. Your dear Carrie* is in the Land of the [ Seal ? ], and already that Carrie is yours. Meantime there is a great deal of love still for you on this side of the [ Seal ? ].
I wish you could have seen the sweet look on the [ face ? ] of [ deletion ] [ 5 unrecognized words ]
When S.W.* and I went to [ 2 or 3 unrecognized words ] Lily,* and she said -- "I am so pleased that so many beautiful flowers are going up to Miss Jewett tomorrow."
I have had three days with our dear S.W. and she is pretty well and not so jaded as some times, she too has a [ heavy ? ] cold but it is nearly gone. I have seen Mrs. Fields* and yesterday we lunched with her and Mm Blanc at Mrs Wirt Dexters. Minnie Pratt the other person there. Have you seen Nelly's* new story{,} very sweet and feeling=full I think, better than Christine Rochefort. But just how she can write of the sufferings of an honorable wife married to a dishonorable husband and not think of Charley -- I do not understand. Evidently she does not, or she would avoid the theme.
Goodbye Sarah dearest -- give my love to Mary* & I go home on Tuesday
Yours ever Coolidge
Notes
1897: Associated with this letter is an envelope addressed to Jewett in South Berwick, canceled 19 April 1897.
Carrie: Woolsey comforts Jewett after the 1 April death of her sister, Carrie Jewett Eastman. Key to Correspondents.
Lily: Identifying Lily without more information is not easy. The most likely candidates are Elizabeth Gaskell Norton, sister of Jewett correspondent Sara Norton, Lily Fairchild, mother of Jewett correspondent, Sally Fairchild, and Jewett correspondent Lily Mason Hoppin. Key to Correspondents.
S.W.: Sarah Wyman Whitman. Key to Correspondents.
Fields ... Blanc ... Dexter's ... Pratt: See Key to Correspondents for Annie Adams Fields and Marie Thérèse de Solms Blanc.
Josephine Moore (1846-1937) was the widow of Chicago lawyer Wirt Dexter (1832-1890).
Minnie Pratt probably is Miriam Foster Pratt (1835-1906), sister of one of Fields's close friends, Helen Olcott Bell and daughter of another, Helen (Nelly) Pratt Prince. See Bell and Prince in Key to Correspondents.
Nelly's new story: Helen Choate Prince was the author of The Story of Christine Rochefort (1895) and A Transatlantic Chatelaine (1897). Her husband was Charles Albert Prince (1852-1943). Key to Correspondents.
Mary: Mary Rice Jewett. Key to Correspondents.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University, Cambridge, MA. bMS Am 1743 Box 5, Item 244.
Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Harriet Jackson Lee Morse*
19 April
[ 1897 ]*
Thank you so [ much corrected ] for your dear and kind letter. I should have answered it before but I have been ill with a touch of bronchitis or something of that sort and I am just getting about the house again. My sister's death is a very great sorrow and loss
and makes such a change in many ways. I can see all the snowdrops and spring flowers across the green blooming under her windows and it seems sometimes as if she must stand there and look out at them. . Give my dear love to Fanny and keep much for yourself
Sarah.
Notes
Morse: See Frances (Fanny) Rollins Morse in Key to Correspondents.
1897: This date was penciled in another hand. The rationale, presumably, is that Jewett speaks of the recent death of her sister, Caroline Eastman, which was on 1 April 1897. For this letter, Jewett used black-edged, mourning stationary.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University, Cambridge, MA. bMS Am 1743.1 (123) Box 4, II. Letters from Sarah Orne Jewett.
Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Horace E. Scudder
South Berwick, Maine
April 27, 1897
Dear Mr. Scudder:
I thank you for your Easter letter as
I have already thanked you many times in my heart, but never
with my pen until now because I have been ill. I shall not
forget your kindness nor the words that you said: they came to
me in a moment when I needed them very much.1
One can never really know one's friends
until they come and stand by. These sad spring days have been
full of the sunshine of friendliness to me, after all. While one
always seems to begin a new life in company with the soul that
disappears into 'the world of light,' -- that goes away only to
come nearer to one's heart than ever before. It all seems like a
transfiguration of the old way of loving, and of friendship too.
My nephew2 is such a dear
boy of seventeen and he has been the greatest comfort to his
aunt Mary and me. Last week he was here for his Easter vacation
and he found it harder to be cheerful in the last days than in
the earlier ones, for I can see that he begins to understand
what a change has fallen upon his life and ours, and what a new
relationship to heavenly things. He was too young when his
father died, five years ago, to feel or understand what is
pretty clear to him now.
I think of your Sylvia and her little
sister as I write; dear friends they must be, without
knowing it, and the little one the elder and wiser of the two.3
We are so unconscious of the unseen side of our lives except at
these great moments of revelation, and I thank you from my heart
for letting me share in the light that shone for you at Easter.
With my sister's kindest remembrance,
Yours ever, affectionately,
Sarah O. Jewett
Notes
1 Miss Jewett's
younger sister, Mrs. Caroline Augusta Eastman, died April 1,
1897.
2 Dr. Theodore Jewett
Eastman, last of the direct line of descendants, was the son of
Caroline and Edwin C. Eastman (see Genealogical Chart). Miss
Jewett dedicated The Tory Lover "To T. J. E."
3 Sylvia Scudder's twin
sister was delicate and lived only about a year and a half. Miss
Jewett clung to the metaphysical belief that despite corporeal
separation at death, souls continue to communicate across the
void with those who love them.
This letter is edited and annotated by
Richard Cary in Sarah Orne Jewett Letters; the ms. is
held by Colby College Special Collections, Waterville, Maine.
Sarah Wyman Whitman to Sarah Orne Jewett
April 30, 1897.
The sap mounts in the human tree with
the spring; and I wish I could go into the wilderness and do one
long, rich job freely beneath the stars and the sunshine. You
will know the surge of impulse which sets in with the little
blades of the grass, which matches the maple buds and the
willow's yellowing bark. Ah, to step, some day, further
westward!
Note
This transcription appears in Letters, Sarah Wyman
Whitman. Cambridge, MA: Riverside Press, 1907,
"Letters to Sarah Orne Jewett: 1882-1903," pp. 61-109.
Annie Adams Fields to Lilian Aldrich
May 12th [ 1897 ]*
My dear Lily:
I was sorry to be in Manchester yesterday when you came to the door. Madame Blanc goes to South Berwick on the 25th. She will not be here again for any length of time.
Dear Sarah* cannot stay over until next week{.} Therefore you see I must impose myself alone -- May I come as we arranged on the 6.20 train of the 19th returning here ^Thursday^ by the first convenient train after breakfast? I find myself so
hurried just on the eve of going to Manchester for the summer that I cannot be long away.
Tonight I am much moved by a letter from a Mrs. Clarke employed on the "Herald" enclosing a note from Mr. Holmes,* the Editor who speaks of her "marked ability" -- The Herald is in a bad way just now and they are sending off some of the valuable members of the staff.
This woman has a sick sister and two children dependent upon her.
It seems to me that perhaps you will be so good as to see the members of the firm of Jordan & Marsh and ask them, if a first class stereographer, type= [writer ? ], composer, recommended by Mr. Holmes as "faithful, conscientious of methodical habits, discriminating judgment,
pleasing address, and possessing marked ability in certain literary lines" can find a place where she is needed in this large establishment. She would be useful in getting [ up ? corrected ] advertisements perhaps ----
Annie Fields*
Notes
1897: Marie Thérèse de Solms Blanc. See Key to Correspondents. When she visited in the United States in 1897, she stayed at Sarah Orne Jewett's house in South Berwick, ME, for a few days in late May.
Sarah: Sarah Orne Jewett. See Key to Correspondents.
Holmes: John H. Holmes was editor of the Boston Herald in 1897. See also The Boston Herald and Its History (1878). Mrs. Clarke has not yet been identified.
Jordan & Marsh: Jordan Marsh & Company, a New England department store chain, headquartered in Boston, MA, 1841-1996. What influence Lilian Aldrich had there is not yet known.
Fields: A pair of inked out deletions appears in the bottom left corner of page 4. A similar ink blot appears under the A in "affectionately." These and a few other seemingly random marks seem likely to come from another hand. Possibly the line beneath Fields's signature was added as well.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University: MS Am 1429, Box 6, Items 1446-1538. Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Mrs Bates
[ Begin letterhead ]
South Berwick, Maine
[ End letterhead ]
My dear Mrs Bates*
I have just received your very kind note of the tenth of May and I must say at once in answer that I keep to a strict rule of refusing all invitations to read in public. I have neither the voice nor training for appearing before an audience --
I am sorry to disappoint you and beg you to believe me yours most sincerely
Notes
Bates: Mrs. Bates has not been identified. Presumably, she is the same person to whom Jewett wrote in a letter currently dated 16 April 1890. Particularly in the Boston area, there were several persons who might be in a position to issue a speaking invitation. One example is Clara Smith Bates (1861-1946), spouse of Republican politician John Lewis Bates (1859-1946), who eventually served as governor of Massachusetts.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the John Hay Library of Brown University, Ms.15.132.
Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Lilian Woodman Aldrich
Tuesday 18th May [ 1897 ]*
Dear Lilian
You were so kind to ask Mary & me to come with A.F.* but it happens that I had to be in town for a day or two last week and that now we are looking for friends here, and expect to go to Portland for a day and night beside. Which is all the diversion
that two busy gardening persons ought to promise themselves! We are both much better now and taking up the old life again with its sad difference.* It seemed to pleasant to direct my envelope to you at Ponkapog just now, but I couldn't believe that there was no Mr. Pierce* there except
in memory and association. -- It must be very lovely among your green fields and I feel this morning as if I should wish to entice T.B.* to go fishing with me. I remember everything so well about my pleasant visits. I shall like to think of Annie's being there: I hope she will remember to carry the Victorian Anthology, and I am sure
With love and thanks from Mary & me
S. O. J.
Notes
1897: May 17 fell on a Tuesday in 1897. See notes below.
Mary ... A.F.: Mary Rice Jewett and Annie Adams Fields. See Key to Correspondents.
sad difference: Jewett refers to the recent death of her sister, Caroline Eastman, the previous April. See Key to Correspondents.
Mr. Pierce: Henry Lille Pierce, a close friend of the Aldriches and of Jewett, died 17 December 1896. See Key to Correspondents.
T.B.: Thomas Bailey Aldrich. See Key to Correspondents.
Victorian Anthology ... Robert Buchanans: This appears to be a rare instance of Jewett referring to Fields as "Annie" in a letter.
In the winter and spring of 1896, the Aldriches, Jewett and Fields accompanied Henry Lille Pierce in a steam yacht cruise of the Caribbean. The journey was notable for bad weather, during which all suffered frequently with long bouts of sea-sickness, especially Lilian Aldrich. On this trip, Fields brought her copy of the newly published A Victorian Anthology, 1837-1895: Selections Illustrating the Editor's Critical Review of British Poetry in the Reign of Victoria by Edmund Clarence Stedman (Boston: Houghton, Mifflin, 1895). The anthology includes a generous selection (pp. 279-90) of poems by Scottish author, Robert Williams Buchanan (1841-1901). T. B. Aldrich was notoriously particular about diction and meter in his evaluations of poetry; apparently he was not impressed with Buchanan.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library, Harvard University, Cambridge, Mass. Thomas Baily Aldrich Papers, 119 letters of Thomas Bailey and Lilian Woodman Aldrich, 1837-1926. MS Am 1429 (117). Transcribed and annotated by Terry Heller, Coe College.
At the bottom left of page one, in another hand, is a circled number: 2720.
Sylvie Brunetière to Sarah Orne Jewett
This letter was composed in French; a transcription follows the translation.
Tuesday the 18th of May [ 1897 ]*
Dear Madame
You must now be in Boston, with Mrs. Fields,* where you are catching up on your rest. As for me, I was really quite sad to leave you, having become so accustomed to our daily intimacy that it seemed we would never be parted. Our crossing was one of the best, neither I nor
Monsieur Brunetière suffering a moment from sea-sickness. On the other hand we found Paris quite saddened by the terrible accident of May 4th.* Do you know that Madame Buloz* almost fell victim to it? Her face, eye, ear and arm were badly burned. But she is now somewhat recovered; she was able to receive us the very day of our arrival, and the day before yesterday Monday* she left for [ Vornay? ]. We hope that rest and country air will complete her recovery, which is only a matter of time. Madame de Heredia* and her eldest daughter were also affected, burns and
bruises; they are better, and I have seen them, too. Finally, you know that Madame Bellaigue* has lost her mother and her sister, and that Madame D'Avenel* has died. It will be some time before Paris recovers from this sadness. In the midst of all these misfortunes, I will tell you how happy I was to find my dear Fernande* again! But these are details with which I do not wish to bore you. Monsieur Brunetière sends his regards. As for me, I expect to hear from you soon, and I ask that you embrace Mrs. Fields for me, to whom I will write shortly. I also embrace you with all my heart.
1897: To confirm this date, see notes below.
Ferdinand Brunetière (1849-1906), editor of Revue des Deux Mondes, lectured successfully in the United States in 1897. Marie Thérèse de Solms Blanc accompanied him on the Atlantic voyage to the U.S. See the entry on him in the Catholic Encyclopedia (New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1908), and see Blanc in Key to Correspondents.
Presumably "Sylvie" was Brunetière's wife, but I have not been able to learn more about her. The Bryn Mawr Alumnae Association Report of 1896-7 indicates that Madame Blanc and Madame Brunetière were guests of the college in 1897, confirming that Madame Brunetière made up part of the visiting party during Brunetière's lecture tour (p. 10). She also is mentioned briefly in connection with Brunetière's American tour in Robert Underwood Johnson's Remembered Yesterdays (1923, p. 397).
Fields: Annie Adams Fields. See Key to Correspondents.
May 4th: Wikipedia says: "Bazar de la Charité was an annual charity event orchestrated by the French Catholic aristocracy in Paris beginning in 1885." In 1897, the bazaar was held in a wooden warehouse and included displays made with highly flammable materials. On 4 May, a catastrophic fire in the warehouse killed 126 people, "mostly aristocratic women."
Madame Buloz: François Buloz (1803-1877) was founder and editor of the Revue des Deux Mondes. He married Christine Blaze de Bury (1815-1876). He was succeeded by his son Charles Buloz (1843-1893), whose wife was Louise Richet (1852-1919), the Madame Buloz mentioned in this letter.
Monday: Brunetière's intentions here are unclear. The fire took place on Tuesday 4 May. Perhaps, then, Mme. Buloz was recovered enough to go to the country on the following Monday, 10 May. Or perhaps, she left the day before this letter, 17 May.
Also "des avant-hier lundi" would normally be "dès avant-hier lundi." Brunetière is somewhat cavalier with her accent marks throughout this letter. Though it often is unclear which marks she intends, we have presented what she seems to have intended and, where we could not tell, we have used those considered correct.
Madame de Heredia: Probably, this is Louise Cécile Despaigne (1848-1928), the wife of Cuban-born French poet, José-Maria de Heredia (1842-1905). The middle of their three daughters was the French author, Marie de Régnier (1875-1963). Her older sister, probably the daughter mentioned here, was Hélene Elisabeth Caridad de Heredia (1871-1953). See the Wikipedia entry on José-Maria de Heredia.
Madame Bellaigue: Gabrielle Hoskier Bellaigue (1863-1936) was the wife of French music critic Camille Bellaigue (1858-1930). Wikipedia lists her sister among the fatalities of the bazaar fire: "Marie Hoskier (1858–1897), was the daughter of Emile Hoskier, the Danish consul general in Paris, and of Elise Weyer…, and the wife of Eugène Roland-Gosselin, who belonged to a leading family of Parisian stockbrokers. A Protestant convert to Catholicism, she was very active in charitable projects."
Also killed in the fire was her mother "Elise Weyer (1836–1897), wife of Emile Hoskier, the Danish consul general in Paris."
Madame D'Avenel: According to Wikipedia and the Charity Bazaar Memorial website, among the fatalities in the bazaar fire was Laura Meinell, Viscountess of Avenel (1855-1897), wife of the economic historian Viscount Georges d'Avenel, "Viscountess d'Avenel kept a salon noted for the attendance of leading figures in literature, the arts and diplomacy. On returning home from the catastrophe she did not seem seriously hurt, but she later died of internal injuries."
Fernande: The Brunetières had no children. It appears that Fernande Dieuzeide was the Brunetières' niece and adopted daughter. She is mentioned as Brunetière's god-daughter in the foreword of J. M. H. Van der Lugt's L'Action Religieuse de Ferdinand Brunetière (1936).
This letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University, Cambridge, MA: b MS Am 1743, Sarah Orne Jewett Correspondence I, Letters to Sarah Orne Jewett, *Brunetière, Sylvie. 1 letter; [n.d.] Identifier: (29). Transcription, translation and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College, with essential assistance from Jeannine Hammond, Professor of French, Emerita, at Coe College.
Transcription of the French Manuscript
Mardi le 18 mai
Chère Madame
Vous devez être sans doute maintenant à Boston, auprès de Mme Fields, et vous vous y reposez de toutes vos fatigues. Pour moi, j'ai vraiment été bien triste de vous quitter, car je m'étais accoutumée à cette intimité de tous les jours, et il me semblait que nous ne devions plus nous séparer. Nous avons en pour notre retour la meilleure traversée du monde, ni moi ni
Mr Brunetière n'avons été malades un seul instant. Il est est vrai qu'en revanche nous avons trouvé Paris tout attristé du terrible accident du 4 mai. Savez-vous que Mme Buloz a bien failli en être victime? Elle a été grièvement brûlée au visagé, à l'œil, a l'oreille et au bras. Mais elle est maintenant un peu remise; elle a pu nous recevoir le jour même de notre arrivée, et des avant-hier lundi elle est partie pour [ Vornay ? ]. Nous espérons que le repos et l'air de la campagne achèveront sa guérison qui n'est plus qu'une affaire de temps. Mme de Heredia et sa fille ainée ont aussi été atteintes, brûlées et
contusionnées; elles vont mieux: je les ai vues aussi. Enfin vous savez que Mme Bellaique a perdu sa mère et sa soeur, et que Mme D'Avenel est morte. Il se passera du temps avant que Paris soit remis de son émotion. Au milieu de tous ces malheurs, vous dirai je combien j'ai été heureuse de retrouver ma chère Fernande! Mais ce sont là des détails dont je ne veux pas vous ennuyer. Mr Brunetière se rappelle à votre souvenir. Pour moi, j'attends bientôt de vos nouvelles, et vous priant de bien embrasser pour moi Mme Fields, à qui j'écrirai prochainement, je vous embrasse aussi de tout mon cœur.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Robert Collyer*
21 May
1897
My sister Mary* and I send you our love and thanks for your most kind and dear letter which came today. We have thought of you and spoken of you often since this great trouble* fell upon us and it would be such a comfort to think that we could see you again this summer . . My sister Mrs. Eastman's death was very sad
and unexpected to her poor boy and to us -- She has been in ill health at times but this last year I have often thought that I had never known her so bright and well. She seemed to enter into Theodore's life with him and was looking forward to his going to college this next autumn with such eager pleasure. "The Other House" looks so strange to us across the green yard with all its windows dark for almost the first time. You will understand
what new cares have fallen upon Mary and me. There have been so many changes for us in these later years and now we are alone of all our household and the family name here in the village where I remember half a dozen families of our kinfolks. "They have all gone into a world of light"* -- how often I say those words to myself! "They have all gone into a world of light!" --
-- I hope that we shall see you here in the old house again
before long dear friend -- You must think of it as you make your summer plans.
Sarah O. Jewett.
I have read my sermon books a good deal -- those that came at Christmas, and I hope they preach me into being better.
Notes
Collyer: The Maine Women Writers Collection speculates that the recipient of this letter was Reverend Collyer. The rationale for this is not known. The post-script of the letter suggests that the recipient may be a clergyman who has published sermons, such as Rev. Collyer. While it is reasonable to believe Collyer was this letter's recipient, we cannot yet be certain of this.
Mary: Mary Rice Jewett. See Key to Correspondents.
world of light: Henry Vaughan (1622-1695) was a Welsh mystical poet who wrote in English. "They are all gone into a world of Light!" appears in Silex Scintilans (1655), which begins, "They are all gone into a world of light! / And I alone sit lingering here; / Their very memory is fair and bright, / And my sad thoughts doth clear."
The manuscript of this letter is held by the University of New England Maine Women Writers Collection, Sarah Orne Jewett Correspondence Box 3 Folder 153
Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Louise Imogen Guiney
[ Begin letterhead ]
South Berwick, Maine
23rd May
[ 1897 ]*
My dear Louise
You have given me a great pleasure both by
your kindness and by this most interesting book of which I
have been a most careful reader. I find in your way of
writing and of choosing your way through the poor poet's work
that nameless
[ Page 2 ]
perfection and sympathy which one so rarely finds in an English book of this sort -- rarely enough in the few volumes of its rank in French. When I stand and* look at this new proof of your exquisite literary gifts and exact scholarship I grow more impatient than ever to sweep away every thing
[ Page 3 ]
else out of your path -- as if with the hemlock broom of my
native parish! --
= These have been sad spring days to me with but few pleasures. You will have known of my dear younger sister's death, a heavy loss to the three of us: my sister Mary and my orphan nephew ^and I^ who are left alone to bear it as best as we may. I have
wished to tell you what help I found in a kind visit from
Father Gorman* and how glad I was to
find that he knew you. -- I must tell you more of this --
Sunday
-- Dear friend I was interrupted in this note yesterday and now I am finishing it at Intervale in the White Mountains where I came to spend Sunday with an old friend. Mount Washington is white with snow and the valley in its bloom of green.* I wish that you were here to see it with me! I hope that you are quite strong again? I saw
Alice Brown* for a few minutes one day in a doctor's
office in town and I was disappointed in hurrying out by
another way to miss saying good by to her. I have not
read her new book [ yet corrected ] but its day
is soon -- I [ look corrected ] forward to it
with great pleasure.
I have had illness as well as sorrow to fight against lately. Somehow these poems of Mangan's have touched me more than I could have believed -- I thought
to care more for what you said about him when I took the book into my hand.
Believe that I am ever your affectionate
and unforgetting friend
Sarah O. Jewett
Notes
1897: Lucey says: "This letter is dated by
Miss Jewett's reference to Miss Guiney's book on Mangan
which appeared in May, 1897 (James
Clarence
Mangan
His
Selected Poems, with a Study by
the editor Louise Imogen Guiney, published by Lamson
Wolffe & Co. of Boston and New York and by John Lane of
London).
"In April of this year Louise Guiney broke
under a sharp attack of meningitis from overwork, and this
illness persuaded her to resign at the first opportunity
from the Auburndale post."
Wikipedia says: "James
Clarence Mangan, born James Mangan (1803-1849), was an
Irish poet."
and: In this letter Jewett often writes an "a" with a long tail for "and." These are rendered here as "and."
my dear younger sister's death ... Mary ... my orphan nephew: Jewett's sister, Caroline Eastman, died on 1 April 1897, leaving her son, Theodore, an orphan, in the care of his aunts, Mary and Sarah Jewett. See Key to Correspondents.
a kind visit from Father Gorman: The Reverend
James P. Gorman was pastor of St. Michael's parish in South
Berwick.
Intervale in the White Mountains ... Mount Washington:
"Intervale
is
an
unincorporated
community
located
on
the
boundary
between the towns of Bartlett and Conway in the White
Mountains of New Hampshire. The village is part of the Mount
Washington Valley, a resort area that also includes the
communities of North Conway and Jackson" (Wikipedia).
Alice Brown: Alice
Brown (1857-1948) was an American novelist, poet and
playwright, best known as a writer of local color stories"
(Wikipedia). He new book in 1897 would have been The Day
of his Youth, a novel of 1897, though Jewett may refer
to the previous book, The Rose of Hope (1896).
The manuscript includes penciled marks and page numbers apparently added in another hand. There also are marks made by paper clips.
This new transcription is from a photocopy held by the Maine Women Writer's Collection, University of New England, Letters from Sarah Orne Jewett, 1875-1890, Box 4, Folder 159, Burton Trafton Jewett Research Collection.
Transcription and revised notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Wyman Whitman to Sarah Orne Jewett
[ 27 May 1897 ]*
Such a dear letter, & Box a-shedding [ perfumes ? ] on a still day.
Now, I send no news, but messages of state and country to the August Ladies* who sit about the Hearthstones of Berwick. Where they may be now in [ their analysis ? ]
[ Page 2 ]
I have been painting [ Mr or Mrs unrecognized name ] portrait all day, [ three unrecognized words with a _____ ] ambassador [ deleted word ] thrown in: for Mabel & [ Mr ? ] Bayard descended on me after class time & took me to [ sail ? ] with them: a more refreshing [ process ? ] than the studio [ unrecognized word ]. He is vigorous, & full of that rich [ unrecognized word ] to which travel has given new wings. He quoted, tell dear A.F.* those lines of Whittiers* about the fame of the peace-[ maker ? ], at the Lord [ unrecognized name ? ] banquet, & the
[ Page 3 ]
next day had more than twenty letters asking where
they came from!
Last night I dined with St.
Gaudens* -- the bronze relief has come out perfectly he says.
Is it Sunday that you come up
darling?
I love you,
Thursday night
Notes
27 May 1897: Penciled in the upper right corner of page 1 in another hand: ( 28 May 1897). The associated envelope is addressed to Jewett in South Berwick, ME, and postmarked 8 May 1897. However, Whitman indicates that she composed her letter the previous evening, Thursday 27 May.
August Ladies: At the time of this letter, the Jewett sisters were entertaining as guests Annie Adams Fields and Marie Thérèse de Solms Blanc. See Key to Correspondents.
Mabel & [ Mr. ] Bayard: Robert Mainfort and Mary Kwas (University of Arkansas) also believe this probably is Thomas F. Bayard (1828-1898), who in May of 1897 had just completed an appointment as U.S. Ambassador to the United Kingdom. His daughter was Mabel Bayard Warren (1862-1924).
A. F.: Annie Adams Fields. See Key to Correspondents.
Whittiers: John Greeleaf Whittier. See Key to Correspondents. It seems likely that Bayard quoted two stanzas from Whittier's "William Francis Bartlett" (1878):
When earth as if on evil dreamsThe occasion at which Mr. Bayard spoke has not yet been identified.
Looks back upon her wars,
And the white light of Christ outstreams
From the red disc of Mars,
His fame, who led the stormy van
Of battle, well may cease;
But never that which crowns the man
Whose victory was peace.
St. Gaudens: Augustus Saint-Gaudens (1848-1907), American sculptor. Wikipedia says "Arguably the greatest of [ his ] monuments is the bronze bas-relief that forms the Robert Gould Shaw Memorial on Boston Common, 1884–1897."
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University. Whitman, Sarah (Wyman) 1842-1904. 92 letters; [1884]-[1903] & [n.d.] Jewett, Sarah Orne, 1849-1909. Sarah Orne Jewett additional correspondence, 1868-1930. MS Am 1743.1 -107. Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Louisa Dresel
South Berwick, Maine
Friday
[ May 28, 1897 ]
Dear Loulie:
I am beginning to feel like myself at last, and I now say that I have thought of you if I have not written. I am sure that the death of that little child must have touched you nearly.
How are you and when do you go to the shore? Mrs. Fields is here just now with Madame Blanc1 and I am taking real joy in their visit. Madame Blanc is very busy with some writing in these rainy days but we see a good deal of her notwithstanding. I wish that my writing table looked as busy as hers, but writing is still the most difficult thing to me. When I say to myself that there is this or that which must be done it quite frightens me! Which will pass presently like other things of this long winter and spring.
I hope that you begin to think of sketching again? I am glad that things promised better about your eyes when you last wrote. Perhaps when we really "get going" again with your brush and my pen we shall feel the good of waiting awhile -- at least I hope so.
I shall be at Manchester on Wednesday evening next week for two or three days at least, so if you are driving that way!
Yours with love and remembrance!
S. O. J.
This accident was from the dropping of
a poor innocent little pen.2
Notes
1Marie Thérèse de
Solms Blanc (1840-1907) used the pen name Th. Bentzon for her
numerous essays in the Revue des Deux Mondes and on
thirty-odd volumes of fiction and literary criticism. She
entertained Jewett and Fields at her home in La Ferté sous
Jouarre, France, and they reciprocated when she visited the
United States in 1893 and 1897. At this time she was writing "Le
Communisme en Amérique" (RDDM, November 15, 1897) and "Dans la
Nouvelle-Angleterre" (RDDM, December 1, 1898), later collected
in her books Choses et Gens d'Amérique (Paris, 1898) and
Nouvelle-France et Nouvelle-Angleterre (Paris, 1899).
2The word "Yours" in
Jewett's valediction is almost obliterated by a blot of ink.
Editor's Notes
death of that little child: The details of this
death are not yet known. Information is welcome.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library, Harvard University, MS Am 1743 (50). This transcription by Richard Cary appeared originally in "Jewett to Dresel: 33 Letters," Colby Library Quarterly 7:1 (March 1975), 13-49, which gave permission to reprint it here. Notes are by Cary.
Louise Imogen Guiney to Annie Adams Fields
I saw my esteemed publisher again today, dear Mrs. Fields. He seemed a bit troubled about the proposition to bring 'The Lark'* along on the 9th, fearful, that is, that you said he was to do so, for the sake of his (F. D.'s)* pleasure. He (F. D. again) wanted to know whether I'd mind writing you a line, to ask you, 'Honor bright', as the children say! for he suggests the move purely because he fancied you might be particularly pleased. (We all admire Burgess' work heartily, but think him not so genuinely charming as he might be!) If you truly want to honor him that much, we two will bring him to dinner, and [ despatch so it appears ] him after; but if you are only bent upon
to we-uns, why, we'll never breathe a word of Thunderbolt Hill to him at all, because we love him not inordinately, poor birdie. He's witty, anyhow, and quaintly grave.
I am looking forward to those days. Will you come in swimming once more, in that dear John Leech hat?* Love to you, and love to Miss Jewett.*
L.I.G.
Notes
May/June 1897: This date is speculative, chosen because it falls within the period during which The Lark magazine was published. It is possible the letter was written at almost any date from 1895 until Jewett's death in 1909.
'The Lark': California artist and critic Bruce Porter (1865-1953) collaborated with fellow artist and author Gelett Burgess (1866-1961) and William Doxey to publish a literary magazine, The Lark (1895-1897).
F.D.: Fred Holland Day, See Key to Correspondents.
John Leech hat: One may speculate that Guiney refers to the British caricaturist, John Leech (1817-1864). See for example his "Two Ladies and a Gentleman in a Rowboat."
Miss Jewett: Sarah Orne Jewett. See Key to Correspondents.
Annie Adams Fields to Sarah Orne Jewett
in order to keep them running!
All is more than well here this lovely morning, however, & no news being good news you will not be sorry or so sorry not to hear.
Mary's* stocks are smiling in the middle of the salvia and corn flowers are planted all around the outside{.}
The cutworms have taken all the first lettuces but they have been well rooted out in a large family and fresh seed put in -- The rose is up and looks delightfully which without your [ patience ? ] could not have [ been ? ] done. You have been helping all the time you see, dear! By the way Georgie left a heart full of love for you. She has been most [ helpful ? ] and affectionate and has gone forth to her new experiences with a homesick heart -- She took a
little walk to the beach and her old home yesterday{.} I was glad of that for I knew she was longing to see the place once more.
No dearest -- The French Poets *[ etc: so it appears ] was left behind I believe probably on the small lamp table --- no, no, here it is !!! I rejoice to say -- I will send it soon to you.
O what fun were the [ Gibralters ? ]! There is a new and first rate candy shop etc. [ "Chaves" ? ] here where Maillards* best is to be found -- but I must write no more dear --
Annie.
Love to the household
Notes
June 1897: This is a speculative date, based on the possibility that Jewett and Fields are reading a particular 1897 book on French poetry in preparation for their planned trip to France in 1898.
Georgie: Georgina Halliburton. Key to Correspondents.
Grew: Probably this is Henry Sturgis Grew (1834-1910). A successful Boston businessman, Mr. Grew had homes in Boston, Hyde Park, and Manchester-by-the-Sea. The Manchester home was the Sumacs, on Masconomo St.
John: A Fields employee.
The French Poets: Jewett and Fields could read French poets in French, but because Fields uses an English title, perhaps she refers to The Nineteenth Century in France; or, Selections from the best modern French literary works. With English translations ... vol. 1. The poets - Lamartine, Hugo, Musset (1897). One may speculate that they were reading this book in preparation for their 1898 trip to France, where they would make a point of traveling to Provence and meeting a some contemporary French poets.
Gibralters ... "Chaves" ... Maillards: Wikipedia says that Gibraltar rock candy, associated with Salem, MA, was the first commercially manufactured candy sold in the United States, beginning in 1806. Henry Maillard was a New York confectioner at 1097 Broadway.
The transcription of "Chaves" is uncertain, and this candy store has not yet been identified.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University, Cambridge, MA. Sarah Orne Jewett Additional Correspondence, 100 letters from Annie Adams Fields, bMS Am 1743.1 Box 1, Item 33.
Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Sarah Wyman Whitman
[ After 31 May of 1897 ]*
South Berwick, Maine, Tuesday.
Dear Fellow Pilgrim, -- I now say that I never had such a beautiful time as on Tuesday of last week, when I came to luncheon at your house, and spoke of Mrs. Kemble,* and of the day of the Shaw Memorial,* and of other things with Mr. Henry Lee.* One treasures the last of that delightful company and generation, as if they were the few last survivors of an earlier and most incomparable one. I look upon that generation as the one to which I really belong, -- I who was brought up with grand-fathers and grand-uncles and aunts for my best playmates. They were not the wine that one can get at so much the dozen now! I write in great haste, but speaking from my heart and quite incompetent to use proper figures of speech in regard to this large and dear subject.
We must say things about the "Life of
Jowett," -- a very true and moving book.* I somehow think of him
and those like him as I remember an unforgettable phrase of T.
Warton's, "The great fact of their love moved on with time."*
Notes
1897: This letter evidently was written not too
long after the dedication of the Shaw memorial. See note
below.
Mrs. Kemble: Fanny (Frances Anne) Kemble (1809-1893) a famous British actress and playwright, a member of the acting Kemble family, who published a volume of poems in 1844 and an autobiography in 1882.
the Shaw memorial: Augustus Saint-Gaudens (1848-1907),
American sculptor, designed a
memorial for the all-Black regiment, which Robert Gould
Shaw (1837-1863) formed and led into battle during the American
Civil War.
Wikipedia says: "The Memorial to Robert Gould
Shaw and the Massachusetts Fifty-Fourth Regiment is a bronze
relief sculpture ... at 24 Beacon Street, Boston (at the edge of
the Boston Common), depicting Col. Shaw and the 54th Regiment
Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry, marching down Beacon Street on
May 28, 1863. It was unveiled May 31, 1897."
Paula Blanchard points out that that
Shaw was the grandson of Louis and Elizabeth Agassiz (306).
Henry Lee: It is likely Jewett means Henry Lee (1817-1898), Boston Banker and author of a pamphlet, "The Militia of the United States." A Civil War veteran, he was the son of the economist, Henry Lee, Sr., also a successful international merchant.
"Life of Jowett": Benjamin Jowett (1817-1893), was Master of Balliol College, Oxford University, and Regius professor of Greek. It is almost certain that Jewett was reading The Life and Letters of Benjamin Jowett (1897) by Evelyn Abbott and Lewis Campbell.
T. Warton "The great fact of their love moved on with time": The quotation is from the story, "The Last Sonnet of Prinzivalle di Cembino" by Thomas Isaac Wharton (1791 - 1856) which appeared posthumously in Harper's Magazine 92 (December 1895) p. 129. It was reprinted in Bobbo and Other Fancies (1897).This letter appears in Annie Fields, Letters of Sarah Orne Jewett (1911), Transcribed by Annie Adams Fields, with notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Sarah Wyman Whitman
Dearest S.W. It was good to see you for that one minute. I now say so to those who are known to have praised the retreating back of a new jacket on a former visit. I shall have to go out of your presence as one property leaves the green -- to save my little feelings . . But I had only a minute on Saturday --
[ Page 2 ]
a high noon in town much vexed with little errands for me, [ deletion ] and always scant of time until I arrived at the last door; a book seller's with much to do for the French Lady* and found it shut since 1 o'clock ----
-- Then I meekly went to the Union Station and waited three quarters of an hour for the 3.20 train but I
have been quite tired out ever since.
A.F.* is going to be left alone by Madame Blanc and me this day: we go to Berwick again for a week or so -- to keep house together, Mary having gone to Helen's at Stonehurst -- A.F. means to go back to town Wednesday morning to stay until Friday afternoon. She was black with guilt when she confessed this to me: there are Meetings and she
-- We were at Alice's* yesterday. I am glad that you are going to Cliffs for an hour soon. They are lofty and incredulous on the subject of [ June corrected ] weather, and amusing and kind and touchingly patient with some things that [ could ? ] provoke them. I think that these days grow sadder and sadder, and I am not sure that any of us can
had left still looked quite chummy.
I went over to breakfast on Thursday before this cheering [ guest ?] came, and I thought that Alice Howe never seemed so sad before. She kept from really crying, but
Today Sally Price* comes down to luncheon. This is all about Cliffs, and about me there is really nothing whatever to say.
Madame Blanc has confided an unexpected but dear wish: she wishes to go to see Shakers ^& I now plan for it^. She had a very dear old French friend who
came over to this country once and lived for some time with Shakers. She was a learned old friend -- but afterward she went back to France again and was contented in a common convent. All this has touched Thérèse with a long cherished imagination -- Thérèse is an eager writer and one who has keen interest in human nature: she is also the granddaughter of the beautiful Marquise de Vitry and the loyal friend and lover of one who was once a Shaker -- you never know from what corner of France she will smile at you next! I now say good by with many apologies.
Darling I do love you and I think of you very often. I wish to be sure that you read much in this letter that is not written{.} What have hearts to do after all with a pen and ink!
Notes
Early June 1897: This date is supported by the notes below.
French Lady: Marie Thérèse de Solms Blanc. Key to Correspondents. Blanc visited the U.S. in 1897. On 8 June 1897, Jewett wrote to Elder Henry at the Alfred, ME, Shaker community to arrange for Blanc to visit. There she names Blanc's friend as a Miss Wild, who has not yet been identified.
A.F.: Annie Adams Fields. Key to Correspondents.
Mary ... Helen's: Mary Rice Jewett and Helen Merriman. Key to Correspondents.
Stowe chapters: Fields's Life and Letters of Harriet Beecher Stowe appeared in 1897.
Alice's: Alice Greenwood Howe, whose summer home was The Cliffs. Key to Correspondents.
Alice Wheatland's: This person has not yet been identified. Jewett was acquainted with Ann Maria Pingree Wheatland (1846-1927). spouse of Massachusetts politician, Stephen Goodhue Wheatland (1824-1892).
Sally Price: This person has not yet been identified. A well-known contemporary was the American botanist, Sarah Frances Price (1849-1903).
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University, Cambridge, MA. bMS Am 1743 Box 6, Item 277.
Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Louisa Dresel
Manchester, Mass.
Monday morning
[June 7, 1897]
Dear Loulie:
We were so sorry to miss seeing you yesterday. We had gone to Mrs. Howe's* for tea and were loitering home afterward, so that we were gone a long time. I did not expect you until the tenth after your letter and I am the more sorry to lose a surprise visit. Of course I should have said before that I should be much pleased about the translations.*
Madame Blanc and I go back to South Berwick today. In great haste, with much love.
Yours ever,
S. O. J.
My blotting paper is to be put at the
head for blotting.1
Cary's Note
1A reflection of the
writing on the second page of this letter was clearly imprinted
on the blank third page when Jewett folded the still wet sheet.
Editor's Notes
Mrs. Howe: Alice Greenwood (Mrs. George Dudley) Howe. See Key to Correspondents.
translations: Information about these translations
is welcome.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library,
Harvard University, MS Am 1743 (50). This transcription by
Richard Cary appeared originally in "Jewett to Dresel: 33
Letters," Colby Library Quarterly 7:1 (March 1975),
13-49, which gave permission to reprint it here. Notes are
by Cary, with additions by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Lilian Woodman Aldrich
Manchester
Monday
[ Summer 1897 ]
[ Begin deleted letterhead ]
South Berwick.
Maine.
Dear Lilian
I have waited until my young people came so that I could write you from headquarters! I find that Elizabeth has only a very few days ^to be here^ and that Theodore* sees cause for hurrying right home as soon as a little visit here is finished -- I do not take it into consideration that
he has hardly been there yet since his school was done (with one journey to Quebec & these visits) and that there ^are^ affairs of high importance and guests expected of his boy friends! He asked me to send you his best hearty thanks -- he thought Mrs. Aldrich was so kind! -- but so did his aunt Sarah before him.
So some other time dear friend
-- We all enjoyed seeing you and dear T.B.* -- you dont know what kind things everybody says! or how nice we all thought you both were. We have been more more serious since T.B. left us,
and missed you both very much. Mr. and Mrs. Warner* are looking forward to seeing you soon. They leave us Wednesday.
With many thanks
S. O. J.
Have T.B. and you read Bobbo?*
Notes
Summer 1897: This is the year in which appeared Thomas Isaac Wharton's "Bobbo" and Other Fancies. Other events in the notes below suggest that this is the summer after the death of Jewett's sister, Caroline Jewett Eastman.
Elizabeth ... Theodore: Theodore Jewett Eastman is Jewett's nephew. See Key to Correspondents. The identity of Elizabeth is uncertain. She may be Elizabeth Perry, a relative about whom little is yet known, except that she may be the Elizabeth Perry (1880-1982), who in 1908 married Theodore's Harvard classmate Henry Lyman (1878-1928). See Caroline Jewett Eastman to Sarah Orne Jewett and Mary Rice Jewett of 1 October 1896.
T.B.: Thomas Bailey Aldrich. See Key to Correspondents.
Mr. and Mrs. Warner: Charles Dudley and Susan Lee Warner. See Key to Correspondents.
Bobbo: Thomas Isaac Wharton (1791-1856) was a Philadelphia lawyer. A collection of his short fiction, "Bobbo" and Other Fancies, was published posthumously in 1897. See also Genealogy of the Wharton Family of Philadelphia
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library, Harvard University, Cambridge, Mass. Thomas Baily Aldrich Papers, 119 letters of Thomas Bailey and Lilian Woodman Aldrich, 1837-1926. MS Am 1429 (117). Transcribed and annotated by Terry Heller, Coe College.
At the bottom left of page one, in another hand, is a circled number: 2717.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Henry Green
South Berwick Maine
Tuesday June 8th
[ 1897 ]*
Dear Elder Henry
You have been so kind as to say that
you would let me come again sometime to visit the Family,* and I
write to ask if you could conveniently entertain me for a day
and night now? I have a friend staying with me -- a French lady:
Madame Blanc* -- who has a great desire to visit
one of your societies -- if only for the sake of a very dear
friend of hers, Miss Wild* (also a French woman), who spent a
year long ago at Mt. Lebanon* and who was a friend of Elder
Frederick Evans* and some of the people of that time -- Madame
Blanc would like very much to see your Sunday worship if it were
possible, and for
that reason, if we come, I think we had better spend Saturday
night and part of Sunday - - You will find Madame Blanc
sincerely interested and reverent -- I think you would all enjoy
seeing her very much -- She speaks English very well.
Will you be so kind as to send me a
word as soon as you can so that I may make other plans in case
this is inconvenient
for you at this time.
With kind regards to all the Family
and remembering my former visit with pleasure,
Yours very truly
S. O. Jewett.
Notes
1897: Mme. Blanc visited the U.S. in 1897, including a
stay at the Shaker Community in Alfred, ME.
Family: Richard Cary notes that at the time of this letter, the Shaker "family" at Alfred, ME comprised from thirty to eighty individuals. He adds this note on Shakers:
In 1747 two English Quakers, James Wardley and his wife Jane, separated from the orthodox Quaker faith and formed "The United Society of Believers in Christ's Second Appearing." In 1774 Mother Ann Lee, an illiterate Englishwoman who believed that she was Christ reincarnated, emigrated to America with eight of these "Shaking Quakers," and in 1787 established the first Shaker colony at Mount Lebanon, New York. By 1794 some dozen colonies were firmly entrenched in New England. The settlement at Alfred, Maine, took root at this time, became a large and prosperous communistic society by 1875, but by reason of declining numbers (one of the original tenets of Shakerism is celibacy) was abandoned in 1925. The Shakers were devoted to pacifism, sobriety, artistry, industry, and good works.
Madame Blanc ... Miss Wild: Marie Thérèse de Solms Blanc. Key to Correspondents. Miss Wild has not been identified.
Elder Frederick Evans: Frederick William Evans
(1808-1893) was a well-known leader of the Mt. Lebanon Shaker
Village at New Lebanon, NY. See Historical Dictionary of the
Shakers (2008), by Stephen J. Paterwic, pp. 69-72.
Wikipedia.
The manuscript of this letter is held by Colby College Special
Collections, Waterville, ME: JEWE.1. Richard Cary included his
transcription in Sarah Orne Jewett Letters.
New transcription and notes by Terry
Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Harriet Prescott Spofford
9 June
1897
South Berwick, Maine
[ End letterhead ]
My dear Friend
How very kind of you to send me your
story!* I am so sure of finding real delight in it that I write
you before I have read it -- and send that note flying off with
all my thanks. I have been at Manchester to help to begin the
summer house-keeping there, and Annie* and I were delighted with
the coming of
your book of exquisite poetry* on her birthday -- I never had
seen the poem of the old woman singing, and it went to my heart
-- Wasn't it strange that each of [ us corrected ], you
and I should have had the pathos of that so near to our hearts
at the same time. I tried to make people feel it in my Pointed
Firs* page
where old Mrs. Blackett sang -- but I should like to borrow
your words and be sure that they were read!
Annie is hoping that you will come
over to Thunderbolt Hill when my dear French friend Madame
Blanc* and I get back. Just now we are here keeping the old
house together and looking
at the green fields with the eager delight of children. I have given her some sweet fern and some bayberry and some young checkerberry leaves, and so now she knows New England. It is good to have the real [ pleasure corrected ] of her being here for this has been a sad spring to me with the sudden death of my younger sister* in April. The world seems much changed by that going. ----------------
Goodbye, dear friend, from your
sincere and affectionate S. O. Jewett
Please give my best remembrance to your household, and especially the little niece* whom I look for in the train but do not see half as often as I wish.
Notes
story: Richard Cary says the story was "A Guardian
Angel," Harper's 94 (May 1897), 941-956.
Annie: Annie Adams Fields, whose summer home was
on Thunderbolt Hill in Manchester by the Sea, MA. Her
birthday was 6 June. Key to Correspondents.
poetry: Cary also identifies Spofford's In Titian's Garden and Other Poems (Boston, 1897) and the poem Jewett mentions, "On An Old Woman Singing," page 46.
Pointed Firs: In "The Old Singers," Chapter 11 of
The Country of the Pointed Firs (1896), Mrs. Blackett and
her son sing several songs together.
niece: This niece has not yet been identified.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Irving Bemis Mower
Monday morning
[ 14 June 1897 ]*
My dear Mr. Mower
I thank you very much for your kind
note and for your beautiful piece of quartz which I shall
treasure very much especially if you would consent to lending
it to me! I cannot quite bear to rob your collection of such a
fine thing or to rob you of your pleasant associations with it.
A collector has a peculiar affection for such treasures as I
very well know.*
-- This shall live on my desk as long as my conscience will let
it and perhaps a
little longer, and I shall never see it without remembering the
kind thought that sent it there -- Believe me, I appreciate your
goodness very much!
With my best wishes, I am
Yours sincerely
S. O. Jewett
Notes
1897: Richard Cary provided this date with no apparent
rationale. Assuming his superior knowledge, I have accepted it.
know: Cary says: "Collecting interesting rock
specimens was Reverend Mower's hobby; he took frequent field
trips in this pursuit. The Maine geological exhibit at the
World's Columbian Exposition at Chicago in 1893 was prepared by
him."
The manuscript of this letter is held by Colby College Special
Collections, Waterville, ME: JEWE.1. Richard Cary included his
transcription in Sarah Orne Jewett Letters.
New transcription and notes by Terry Heller,
Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Henry Green
Monday morning
[ June 14, 1897 ]*
Dear Elder Henry
Madame Blanc* and I hope to take the morning train ^for Alfred^*
tomorrow ^by Rochester^. I am sorry that I could not manage to
come today, and we were much disappointed at having to give up
our plan for Sunday.* I think that we had better stay over night
if it is convenient for you, but I hope that
you and the good sisters will not make yourselves any extra trouble for us.
Yours very truly,
S. O. Jewett
Notes
1897: Monday fell on 17June in 1897. Richard Cary writes:
On Tuesday morning began a torrential rain which continued for several days, washing away the railroad embankment and leaving the northern end of the bridge without support. When the cloudburst subsided, Miss Jewett and her French guest attempted to drive the twenty miles to Alfred by horse and carriage but soon realized the impracticality of their plan. They had to wait until the railroad bridge had been repaired before entraining, and then had to be satisfied with the long detour by way of Rochester, New Hampshire.
For a detailed account of this visit to Alfred see Th. Bentzon, "Le Communisme en Amérique," Revue des Deux Mondes, CXLIV (November 15, 1897), 300-335, of which one section is subtitled, "Une Visite chez les Shakers"; also Carl J. Weber, "New England Through French Eyes Fifty Years Ago," New England Quarterly, XX (September 1947), 385-396.
In her article Madame Blanc cites two of the exceptionally gracious sisters: Eldress Lucinda and Eldress Harriet [N. Coolbroth], who "is related to Stonewall Jackson."*
In photographs of residents at the Alfred Maine Shaker village
in the 1890s, at Maine History Online, appear Eldress Harriet
Goodwin (1823-1903) and Eldress Harriett Newell Coolbroth
(1864-1953). On Coolbroth see Historical Dictionary of
the Shakers (2008), by Stephen J. Paterwic, pp. 48-9.
Among the Alfred Shakers was Lucinda Taylor
Madame Blanc: Marie Thérèse de Solms Blanc. Key to
Correspondents.
Alfred: Cary notes that the Shaker settlement at
Alfred, Maine, began at the end of eighteenth century. It
"became a large and prosperous communistic society by 1875, but
by reason of declining numbers (one of the original tenets of
Shakerism is celibacy) was abandoned in 1925."
New transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Wyman Whitman to Sarah Orne Jewett
June 14, 1897. Old Place.
If you knew how grave I am at sight of
this sea! What wonder it wakes in me, what surmise, what
anguish, what hope!
Notes
This transcription appears in Letters, Sarah Wyman
Whitman. Cambridge, MA: Riverside Press, 1907,
"Letters to Sarah Orne Jewett: 1882-1903," pp. 61-109.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Sarah Wyman Whitman
[ 15 June 1897 ]*
[ Begin letterhead ]
South Berwick.
Maine.
[ End letterhead ]
Dear Fellow Pilgrim I was a going home tomorrow to stay a week or two so I thought best to write and say good-bye. That day you was a going to Bar Harbor I went to Little Boars Head for 1 day and I thought to meet you in Salem a taking the express as is customary but you had gone earlier and taken the other so I was Disappointed and now say so and that I shall never make up for 3/4 of an Hour which I counted upon as if it were the Journey
to Ashfield.*
i now say that i [so written]
never
had
such
a
beautiful
Time
as
on
Tuesday of last week, when I came to luncheon at your House, and
spoke of Mrs. Kemble* and of the day of the Shaw Memorial* and
of other things with Mr. Henry Lee* ----- One treasures the last
of that delightful company and generation as if they were the
few last
survivors of an earlier and most incomparable wine. I look
upon that generation as the one to which I really belong, -- I
who was brought up with grandfathers and grand uncles and aunts
for my best playmates. They were not the wine that one can get
at so much the dozen now! I write in great haste but speaking
from my heart and quite incompetent to use proper figures of
speech in regard to this large and dear subject . .
-- I think you look too tired lately my darling -- do be good
to you for the sake of
me
We must say things about the Life of
Jowett -- a very great and moving book* -- I somehow think of
him and those like him as I remember an unforgettable phrase of
T. Whartons, "The great fact of their love moved on with time
--"*
Notes
15 June 1897: This letter evidently was written
not too long after the dedication of the Shaw memorial.
See note below. The date 19 June 1897 is given in
another hand on the manuscript, presumably an attempt to read
the postmark on the accompanying envelope. However 19 June
fell on a Saturday in 1897, and the envelope is not really
clear. A composition date of 15 June seems a reasonable
guess.
Ashfield: A town in the Berkshire mountains of western Massachusetts, where the family of Sara Norton had a summer cottage. See Key to Correspondents.
Mrs. Kemble: Fanny (Frances Anne) Kemble (1809-1893) a famous British actress and playwright, a member of the acting Kemble family, who published a volume of poems in 1844 and an autobiography in 1882.
the Shaw memorial: Augustus Saint-Gaudens (1848-1907),
American sculptor, designed a
memorial for the all-Black regiment, which Robert Gould
Shaw (1837-1863) formed and led into battle during the American
Civil War.
Wikipedia says: "The Memorial to Robert Gould
Shaw and the Massachusetts Fifty-Fourth Regiment is a bronze
relief sculpture ... at 24 Beacon Street, Boston (at the edge of
the Boston Common), depicting Col. Shaw and the 54th Regiment
Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry, marching down Beacon Street on
May 28, 1863. It was unveiled May 31, 1897."
Henry Lee: It is likely Jewett means Henry Lee (1817-1898), Boston Banker and author of a pamphlet, "The Militia of the United States." A Civil War veteran, he was the son of the economist, Henry Lee, Sr., also a successful international merchant.
"Life of Jowett": Benjamin Jowett (1817-1893), was Master of Balliol College, Oxford University, and Regius professor of Greek. It is almost certain that Jewett was reading The Life and Letters of Benjamin Jowett (1897) by Evelyn Abbott and Lewis Campbell.
T. Wharton's ... "The great fact of their love moved on with time": The quotation is from the story, "The Last Sonnet of Prinzivalle di Cembino" by Thomas Isaac Wharton (1791 - 1856) which appeared posthumously in Harper's Magazine 92 (December 1895) p. 129. It was reprinted in Bobbo and Other Fancies (1897).The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University, Cambridge. MA: Whitman, Sarah (Wyman) 1842-1904, recipient. 25 letters; 1892-[1900] & [n.d.]. Sarah Orne Jewett additional correspondence, 1868-1930. MS Am 1743.1 (126).
Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
There are marks on the manuscript in pencil that presumably were made by Annie Fields as she prepared her transcriptions for The Letters of Sarah Orne Jewett (1911); these are omitted from this transcription.
Henri-Raymond Casgrain to Sarah Orne Jewett
This letter was composed in French; a transcription follows the translation.
15 June, 1897 --
Miss S. O. Jewett
South Berwick,
Maine --
Madame,
I have just received the copy of "The Country of the Pointed Firs,"* that you kindly sent me. This gift gives me
all the more pleasure because the author is one of those that I admire most in the United States. I thank you cordially and beg that you accept the homage of a copy of my "Pilgrimage in the Land of Evangeline,"* which goes to the post office with this letter. I hesitated briefly before choosing this from among my books, because it may seem to you anti-American. You have so lofty a spirit as to put you above such prejudices. I ask that you
remember as you read, that it is a response to some very unjust attacks, in my view, toward the unfortunate Acadians.*
Madame Blanc-Bentzon* has given me a very pleasant surprise by announcing that she proposes to return to Quebec, with you, your sister and your nephew.* I will be delighted to meet you and your kind family.
While awaiting this pleasure, I ask that you accept my expression of deep respect.
Notes
letterhead: A printed design at center top, in black ink, consisting of the stylized, superimposed initials C H R.
An envelope associated with this letter is addressed to Jewett in South Berwick. On the back is a matching stamp of the letterhead. Oddly, it is postmarked on the back in Quebec on "Ju 6 97." Probably, then, the letter was mailed two weeks after it was composed, if it was mailed in this envelope. It is less likely, though not impossible, that it was mailed 9 days before the composition date.
In the Houghton Library folder with the four letters by Casgrain to Jewett is a card. It is not known with which of the four letters the card was included, though this one would be a strong candidate, as it has the pair exchanging books. The card reads:
Professeur à L'Université Laval de Québec
Membre de la Société Royale du Canada
M. C. de la Société hist. de Boston
M. C. de la Soc. de Géographie
de Paris, etc. etc.
Country of the Pointed Firs: Jewett's 1896 novel.
Evangeline: Casgrain's Pélerinage en Pays d'Evangeline (1855). The title refers to the epic poem by the American author, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882).
Acadians: 17th & 18th century French colonials in Canada. Expelled from Canada by the British during the French and Indian Wars, they suffered many privations. Wikipedia.
See also Casgrain's Une Seconde Acadie (1894), about Acadians on Prince Edward Island.
Blanc-Bentzon: Marie Thérèse de Solms Blanc. See Key to Correspondents.
Blanc visited in the United States in 1897, and traveled to Quebec with Jewett, her sister, Mary Rice Jewett, and their recently orphaned nephew, Theodore Jewett Eastman.
This letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University, Cambridge, MA: b MS Am 1743, Sarah Orne Jewett Correspondence I, Casgrain, Henry Raymond, 1831-1904. 4 letters; 1897-1901. Identifier: (38). Transcription, translation and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College, with essential assistance from Jeannine Hammond, Professor of French, Emerita, at Coe College.
Transcription
15 Juin, 1897 --
Miss S. O. Jewett
South Berwick,
Maine --
Madame,
Je viens de recevoir l'exemplaire
de "The Country of the Pointed
Firs," que vous avez eu la complaisance
de m'offrir. Ce don me fait
d'autant plus de plaisir que l'auteur
est un de ceux que j'admire le
plus aux Etats-Unis. Je vous en
remercie cordialement et vous prie
d'agréer l'hommage d'un exemplaire
de mon "Pélerinage en Pays d'Evangeline"
que je confie à la poste en
même temps que celle-ci. J'ai hésité
quelque instants avant de choisir
cetouvrage au milieu de mes autres
publications; car il vous paraîtra
bien anti-américain. Vous avez
cependant un esprit trop élevé
pour ne pas vous mettre au-dessus
des préjugés. Je vous prie de vous
souvenir en le lisant qu'il est une
réponse à des attaques bien injustes à
mon avis à l'égard des infortunés
Acadiens --
Madame Blanc-Bentzon vient
de me causer une très agréable
surprise en m'apprenant qu'elle se
propose de revenir à Québec avec
vous, votre soeur et votre neveu -- Je
serai enchanté de faire votre
connaissance et celle de vos aimables
parents.
En attendant ce plaisir, Je vous
prie d'agréer l' expression de mes
sentiments les plus distingués.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Sarah Wyman Whitman
[ 1897 ]
South Berwick.
Maine.
[ End letterhead ]
These being things to say every day, and so much in this heart about your most dear letter, I find myself wishing for a sort of affectionate short-hand of friendship. One little sheet of paper might count for more than it possibly can now: me writing in a hurry and a long week to report. The French Guest* is always more delightful than ever, and thanks to her help I have got pretty well through with the dullness, the hopeless anxiety and even the heavy indifference which come after a great shock* -- At first
[ Page 2 ]
one is half conscious of a great stimulant and uplifting and it is when that is done and over that the hard pull comes. I shall long look back to these dear rainy days and to the comfort of looking up at so dear a face ----- And the stories! They begin in just the right moment: "Madame - de Beaulaincourt has - told me once -----* "A friend - of mine who was a Russian" --- "In the country of Madame Delzant* which is the country of les Guerins: Maurice and Eugenie" -- and so they begin and go on! -- "Les Rohans son toujours" ----- but I wonder if shall ever [remember the word is blotted ][ Page 3 ]
any of them to tell you? -- On Monday she goes back to Manchester alas for me! and I shall follow as soon as I can, but I cannot say the name of any day. I wish that I could have had you here one day -- one night. I came nearly to the foolish point of asking and only the thought of its being your first week at Old Place* held me back . . Besides you must know very well by this time that you are only too much longed for in this house and come when you choose and do what you like ----- Two days we have been away. Madame Blanc
[ Page 4 ]
has long cherished a desire to see Shakers -- (I wish that she could tell you of her wonderful old friend ['Miss' ? ] Wild* who once spent some time among them{,} the friend of Madame de Beaulaincourt and others:) So we went to the town of Alfred in this county and spent a day and night most happily with Eldresses and Sisters like Lady Abbesses and their good plain nuns: [ the ? ] Elders one of whom was pleasing in his solemnity and cheerful usefulness to the French lady. Next day when we were coming away it was the most enchanting of mornings. (the[ Page 5 ]
Shaker village is on a high hill with a little lake at the foot, and all night when I waked in our cell-like room with its two narrow beds, I could hear the shy whippoorwills and no sound beside --) next day we seemed to return to a noisy and dusty world.I now make confession that after having insisted that we must get back instantly to Berwick I was so tempted [by corrected] the wonderful beauty of the day and the look of the northern hills -- that I changed cars at Rochester and went up to Intervale. I have never seen such [a corrected ] day there -- we
[ Page 6 ]
spent an hour with Helen* had a drive and got back here at Seven. It seemed as if you might be hiding [deleted word] behind the new clock that Dan has given Helen. And which tolls the hours as if for the Execution of Montrose.* There was a large Worcester party present,* and Helen quite[ Page 7 ]
weighed down with responsibility{.} This letter is running to the postoffice [so written] but not quite [deleted word] losing out its love by the way.S.O.J.
Notes
1897: The date of this letter is based upon it referring to a summer visit of Madame Blanc, following upon a "great shock," which almost certainly was the death of Jewett's younger sister, Carrie, in April 1897.
French Guest: Marie Thérèse de Solms Blanc. See Key to Correspondents.
great shock: Caroline Jewett Eastman died on 1 April 1897.
Madame - de Beaulaincourt has - told me once -----: The short and long lines in the quotations from Madame Blanc may be intended to indicate her pauses as she speaks in English. Richard Cary identifies "Ruth Charlotte Sophie de Beaulaincourt (1818-1904), the daughter of the Maréchal Boniface de Castellane, a soldier who served with distinction under both Napoleons, and whose Journals she published in five volumes (1896-1898)."
Madame Delzant which is the country of les Guerins: Maurice and Eugenie: Eugénie de Guérin (1805-1848) was a French Catholic writer whom Jewett admired especially for her letters. She was the sister of the poet Maurice de Guérin (1810-1829).
Alidor (1848-1905) and Gabrielle Delzant (1854-1903) resided in Paris and at Parays (Lot-et-Garonne). He was a lawyer, a bibliophile, editor, and author and wrote, among other works, a biography of the brothers Goncourt.
Richard Cary notes that Gabrielle was cited by Violet Paget for the "admirableness of her brains" and her "extraordinary charm of high breeding." Madame Delzant, an aspiring author, compiled extensive memoranda and rough drafts of books on Port Royal and the Princesse de Liancourt but did not live to publish them. Her husband edited Lettres de Gabrielle Delzant (1906), for which Mme. Blanc wrote a preface.
See also "Paget in Parays" (1960) by Archille H. Biron.
Les Rohans son toujours: Translation from French, "The Rohans are always ..." Presumably, Blanc refers to a well-known family of Breton nobility, the House of Rohan.
Old Place: The Whitman summer home in Beverly, MA, near Manchester-by-the-Sea.
Wild: Miss Wild has not been identified, though Jewett tells Henry Green a little more about her in a letter of 8 June 1897.
Shakers ... Alfred: Cary notes that the Shaker settlement at Alfred, Maine, began at the end of eighteenth century. It "became a large and prosperous communistic society by 1875, but by reason of declining numbers (one of the original tenets of Shakerism is celibacy) was abandoned in 1925."
Helen: Helen Bigelow Merriman. See Key to Correspondents.
large Worcester party present: Daniel Merriman was minister of the Central Congregational Church in Worcester, MA, where he and his wife were active in the cultural and artistic life of the community. A "Worcester party" presumably would include friends from this area.
the Execution of Montrose: Jewett probably refers to William Edmonstoune Aytoun's (1813-1865) poem, "The Execution of Montrose," which tells the story of the death of James Graham, 1st Marquess of Montrose (1612-1650), known as "the Great Montrose," whose support for King Charles I led to his death sentence from Parliament. Jewett would likely remember the poem from Edmund C. Stedman's A Victorian Anthology (1895).
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University, Cambridge. MA: Whitman, Sarah (Wyman) 1842-1904, recipient. 25 letters; 1892-[1900] & [n.d.]. Sarah Orne Jewett additional correspondence, 1868-1930. MS Am 1743.1 (126). Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Henry Green
[ Begin letterhead ]
South Berwick,
Maine.
[ End letterhead ]
[ To the right of the letterhead
19 June
1897
Dear Elder Henry
I thank you for your kind note. I
thought that I should like to leave the small present for your
library -- if only to show something of my appreciation of the
kindness and true hospitality that every one showed to us.
Madame Blanc* and I send our love and best
wishes
to you all. She speaks often of the pleasure of her visit and especially of her talks with Eldress Harriet,* [ but corrected ] indeed we remember you all with sincere interest and affection.
I thank you for your invitation to
come with my sister* and beg you to believe me
Most truly your obliged
friend
Sarah O. Jewett
Notes
Madame Blanc: Marie Thérèse de Solms Blanc. Key to
Correspondents.
Richard Cary notes:
Madame Blanc reports in her Revue article that Miss Jewett talked with Elder Henry about the improvement in the Shaker schools and about "the celebrated novelist Howells, who had painted a Shaker village in one of his finest books, The Undiscovered Country." In the evening Elder Henry asked Miss Jewett to tell about her voyage to the Antilles, and "she delivered her account with a good deal of verve. The Shaker women were keenly interested."
For William Dean Howells, see Key to Correspondents.
Bartleby.com says "The Undiscovered
Country by Howells (1880), is a favorite with many of the
author’s lovers. The central figure, Dr. Boynton, an
enthusiastic spiritualist, is an admirable study of a
self-deceiver, an honest charlatan. He is a country doctor, who
has become a monomaniac on the subject of spiritualistic
manifestations, and has brought up his daughter, a delicate,
high-strung, nervous girl, as a medium. His attempts to take
Boston by storm end in disaster. He is branded as a cheat, his
daughter is believed to be his confederate, and he and Egeria
seek refuge in a community of Shakers, whose quaint and kindly
ways are portrayed with a loving pen."
Eldress Harriet: In photographs of residents at the
Alfred Maine Shaker village in the 1890s, at Maine History
Online, appear Eldress Harriet Goodwin (1823-1903) and Eldress
Harriett Newell Coolbroth (1864-1953). On Coolbroth see Historical
Dictionary
of the Shakers (2008), by Stephen J. Paterwic, pp. 48-9.
sister: Mary Rice Jewett. Key to
Correspondents.
New transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Marie Thérèse de Solms Blanc to Sarah Orne Jewett
South Berwick, Maine
[ End letterhead ]
[ To the right of the letterhead ]
This idea of little [ Maggy ? ]* being lost and brought back in the hands of a stranger! I am afraid all this will end badly for the bold and
thoughtless little thing. We miss you. Annie reads to me on the piazza* the finished chapters of her book* which I think most charmingly and cleverly done and which interests me more than I can say. I wind up her skeins of silk meanwhile pour me donner une contenance* and not to seem idle. It is a little like the [ sowing so spelled ] of an actress on the stage without a knot, but my eyes are the better for it.
life and we carried such red faces and such a headache to the first church, and Hawthorne's house,* etc{.}! the son of Arved guessing all the while that I was a Southerner because his Southern customers had always [ shown corrected ] a liking for witches, the Northern [ prefering so spelled ] Hawthorne of course! -- We spent a fortune at a Japanese bazar [ buying corrected ] bowls and plates with the [ witchhouse so written ] made in Japan after designs from New England (a hideous combination) and ^just^ ask Annie to show you her beautiful striped cup!!! -- The next day we were far too tired to be able to go to town. So we only
drove to Magnolia and Mrs Curtis,* I saying you would allow nothing more. And in fact it was enough as we could to keep our eyes open at nine o'clock and went to bed after some sleepy talk. I am writing the [ short corrected ] essay about [ Machard ? ]. It will be work for our little shop. On Saturday we go to Mrs Whitman.* On Tuesday to Boston and I from there to Hartford, after which I shall be ready for any 4th of July business, crackers and all. I have in hand my passage for the 24th [ on ? ] the Gascogne.* It appears after what Mme
Most tenderly your own and a good hearty kiss to your dear sister.
1897: Mme. Blanc's second visit to the U.S. in 1897 was cut short, when family troubles called her home in July. The itinerary she describes here has her arriving in Hartford, CT, after the Tuesday before 4 July, which was 29 June. Presumably, then, this letter was composed on the previous Thursday, 24 June.
Mary: Probably this is Mary Rice Jewett. See Key to Correspondents.
Maggy: This person or pet has not yet been identified.
piazza: This detail indicates that Blanc is staying with Annie Adams Fields at her summer home in Manchester-by-the-Sea, MA. See Key to Correspondents.
book: Fields's Life and Letters of Harriet Beecher Stowe appeared in 1897. Possibly, however, she was working at this time on Nathaniel Hawthorne (1899).
pour me donner une contenance: French: "in order to put on a good appearance."
Arvedson: This was a fairly common name in Salem, MA. At least three male Arvedsons born before 1840 are buried in Salem's Harmony Grove Cemetery.
Salem businesses continue to offer visitors a variety of events and guided tours associated with the Salem witch trials of 1692-3 and with contemporary witchcraft and the supernatural.
Hawthorne's house: American author, Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804-1864) was born in Salem, MA, and resided there at various times, most notably in the middle 1840s. Various buildings in the town are associated with him, including his birthplace and the House of the Seven Gables, setting for his novel of that title. Wikipedia.
Magnolia and Mrs Curtis: Magnolia is a village adjoining Manchester-by-the-Sea, MA. Many Curtises resided in the Manchester area in 1897. A neighbor of Fields was Harriot Appleton Curtis (1841-1923). See Find-a-Grave.
Her husband was Civil War general, Greely Stevenson Curtis (1830-1897). Wikipedia.
Machard: Probably French painter, Jules Louis Machard.(1839-1900). Blanc is not yet known to have published an essay about him.
Mrs Whitman: Sarah Wyman Whitman. See Key to Correspondents.
Gascogne: S. S. La Gascogne was a steamship of the Compagnie Générale Transatlantique, built in 1886.
Delzant: Gabrielle Delzant (1854-1903) was a close friend of Mme. Blanc. Richard Cary notes that Madame Delzant was an aspiring author, compiled extensive memoranda and rough drafts of books on Port Royal and the Princesse de Liancourt, but did not live to publish them. Her husband, Alidor, edited Gabrielle Delzant: Letters, Souvenirs (1904). Geneviève was the elder of their two daughters.
This letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University, Cambridge, MA: b MS Am 1743, Sarah Orne Jewett Correspondence I, Letters to Sarah Orne Jewett, Blanc, Thérèse (de Solms) 1840-1907. 10 letters; 1892-1906 & [n.d.], 1892-1906, Identifier: (23). Transcription, translation and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College, with essential assistance from Jeannine Hammond, Professor of French, Emerita, at Coe College.
Annie Adams Fields to Lilian Aldrich
Boston. Thursday
[ June 1897 ]*
My very dear Lilian:
"Sadie"* goes to South Berwick today. She was greatly disappointed to find that you were away yesterday{.} We both wanted to go to you and she found she had the time; but today she has an engagement with her sister in Exeter.
I am only here to pick up some threads dropped when I was tired in [ office ? ] and fled to Manchester. We have had a delightful month there and I am rested and refreshed by it.
I particularly want to see you both! but I do not see the moment just now when I can go to you. We look forward to these days by the sea
in July which you so kindly offer us.
Please thank Mr. Pierce* [ for written over something ] his hospitable invitation. I am going to Watch Hill next week to see my sister Elizabeth* who has lately returned from a year's absence and the following week I go to join Sarah at South Berwick.
gratefully
yours
Annie Fields.
I was almost sorry to know that very poor little lost letter [ ever or even ? ] reached you! Fancy sometimes leads [ me written over something ] to think that you have said what you felt in a letter but alas! how that fancy speeds away when the results are spread before you! but at least I am always most affectionately yours (and his).
Notes
June 1897: Fields suggests that she is writing in June or possibly early July. In about 1894, the Aldriches began spending their summers by the sea at the Crags (built in 1893) in Tenant's Harbor, ME, where Jewett and Fields often visited them. In 1895, Jewett and Fields rented their own cottage near Tenant's Harbor. On 15 June 1898, Elizabeth Adams died. I have arbitrarily chosen 1897 for this letter, on the assumption that Fields really means that she and Jewett have visited the Aldriches at this location more than once. However, 1896 remains a possible year.
Sadie: A nickname for Sarah Orne Jewett used by the Aldriches, Jewett and Fields, a reference to the American actress Sadie Martinot. See Key to Correspondents.
Pierce: Henry Lillie Pierce. See Key to Correspondents.
Elizabeth: Elizabeth Adams. See Fields in Key to Correspondents. Residing in Baltimore, MD, she kept a studio at Watch Hill, RI.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University: MS Am 1429, Box 6, Items 1446-1538. Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
July 8th
[ 1897 ]*
Will you be so kind as tell me the price of all the volumes of Poole's Index (for use in Libraries, and which I think you publish?) [ unrecognized mark ] And will you please to advance me $ [ various numbers superimposed ]. ^150^ on my copyright account, sending the
cheque here, care of Mrs Fields?*
Yours very truly
S. O. Jewett.
Notes
1897: The first page, as usual, appears on the right half of a folded page. The left half has two holes punched at the left margin. In the top left corner is a Houghton Mifflin date stamp: 10 July 1897. Another similar stamp appears on the reverse side.
Poole's Index: Poole's Index to Periodical Literature, founded by American bibliographer William Frederick Poole (1821 - 1894), was the standard bibliographic reference for literature in American magazines and periodicals. For a time, Houghton Mifflin was the publisher.
Mrs. Fields: Annie Adams Fields. See Key to Correspondents.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University in Houghton Mifflin Company correspondence and records, 1832-1944, Jewett, Sarah Orne, 1849-1909. 68 letters from; 1870-1907 and [n.d.]. MS Am 1925 (962). Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Louise Imogen Guiney to Annie Adams Fields
My dear friend:
I have parted with Uncle Sam, and hasten to tell you so! for I am as pleased a soul as there is in 42o no. lat. It was the only thing to do; and when I see you, I will the tale unfold. Do you think you would like me to come down the very last days of July, say the 29th ---- 31st? Or the following week instead? I needn't say I look forward to any sight of you with joy. Just now I am pretty tired, with P.
O. adjustments, sessions there until eleven at night, and the heat, always my special bugbear. Next week I am off fo Port Clyde, ME., chiefly on business (which sounds very grand! doesn't it?) but I must return immediately. My mother is extremely well, and Mr. Hamilton Mabie* has just said, as you did, that he likes my book:* so I ought to be happy. My affectionate thought to Miss Jewett,* wherever she be.
8th July --
Auburndale, Massachusetts.
Notes
1897: Guiney resigned from the United States Post Office in 1897.
Uncle Sam: Uncle Sam is a visual representation of the United States government. Guiney began working for the U.S. Post Office in 1894 and resigned in 1897. During her tenure, she faced opposition for being Irish Catholic.
Hamilton Mabie: Hamilton Wright Mabie (1846 -1916) was an American author and critic.
my book: In 1897, Guiney published a collection of essays, Patrins.
Miss Jewett: Sarah Orne Jewett. See Key to Correspondents.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Huntington Library, San Marino, CA, in the James T. Fields collection Box 26: mss FI 1569. Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Mary Rice Jewett
Monday morning
[ July 1897 ]*
Dear Mary
---------------- Mrs. Gardner came too and for a wonder, Mr. Gardner,* most friendly and nice. Yesterday afternoon Therese* having finished a paper about the bringing up of French girls we sat down together and she read it out to me and I wrote it down straightening her dear English now and then in spots -- as you may suppose. And Sally Fairchild and Jess* came to supper and Jess played as never before and sent love and had enjoyed being with her cousins in Providence but was so sorry she couldn’t come to Berwick. ---------------------------------------------------------
Sarah
NotesThe hyphens at the beginning and end indicate this is an
incomplete transcription.
1897: This date is inferred from the presence of
Madame Blanc in Boston and Manchester MA that summer.
Mrs. Gardner ... Mr. Gardner: Isabella Stewart and Jack Gardner. See Key to Correspondents.
Therese ... French Girls: Marie Thérèse de Solms Blanc.
See Key
to
Correspondents.
Probably, Mme. Blanc was consulting with
Jewett about text for a book she published in 1899, Causeries
de
Morale Pratique, textbook for the education of young
French girls. See Richard Cary "Miss Jewett and Madame Blanc," pp. 477-8.
Sally Fairchild and Jess: For Fairchild and Jessie Cochrane, see Key to Correspondents.
This text is from transcriptions from mixed repositories in the Maine Women Writer's Collection, University of New England, Letters from Sarah Orne Jewett, 1875-1890, Folder 74, Burton Trafton Jewett Research Collection. For more information about the individual transcription, contact the Maine Women Writers Collection. Preparation by Linda Heller. Notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.Sarah Orne Jewett to Lilian Woodman Aldrich
9 July [ 1897 ]*
South Berwick.
Maine.
Dear Lilian
Madame Blanc* has been suddenly called back to France so that I rushed back from Berwick and went to town with her yesterday and she is sailing tomorrow morning from New York. This is very sad for she had planned to stay on until the 24th and
to go to you, if you and T.B.* would like to have her -- for a day or two this week. She spoke several times of her disappointment in not seeing you again. She has been busy writing, but ^the last of^ this week, and next week she meant to carry out some pleasant plans.
I miss her dreadfully
already: it has been delightful and such a help beside to [ have written over something ] her here and in Berwick where we had some lovely quiet weeks together.
I have not much news to tell you. I am getting back to writing again but not very fast! A.F. is just finishing her book about Mrs. Stowe* and Madame Blanc and I think
it is most successful. She has insisted that she was not writing it but compiling but you somehow find her touch pretty often after all.
I am going home again in a day or two, and I hope that my sister and Theodore* and I can go off on a little journey. He has passed the dreaded "exams" with four hours to spare and two credits which pleased his aunts. With love to T.B. and to you.
S. O. J.
Notes
1897: See notes below.
Madame Blanc: Marie Thérèse de Solms Blanc. See Key to Correspondents. Mme. Blanc visited the United States several times, making one extended stay in 1897.
T.B.: Thomas Bailey Aldrich. See Key to Correspondents.
A.F. ... book about Mrs. Stowe: Annie Adams Fields and Harriet Beecher Stowe. See Key to Correspondents. Fields's volume, Life and Letters of Harriet Beecher Stowe appeared in 1897.
sister and Theodore: Mary Rice Jewett and Theodore Jewett Eastman. See Key to Correspondents. Theodore's mother died in April of 1897, and his aunts Mary and Sarah became his guardians.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library, Harvard University, Cambridge, Mass. Thomas Baily Aldrich Papers, 119 letters of Thomas Bailey and Lilian Woodman Aldrich, 1837-1926. MS Am 1429 (117). Transcribed and annotated by Terry Heller, Coe College.
At the bottom left of page one, in another hand, is a circled number: 2719.
Annie Adams Fields to Lilian Aldrich
[ 9 July 1897 ]*
Dear Lily:
Although Sarah* has written, I must also thank you for your dear affectionate note of yesterday --
I wish you would both come to pass a day and night before you leave for Maine.
If you can do so between Tuesday 13th and the following Friday please let me know.
I did not write last week because I said
"will write"; meaning in case you could come I would send [ unrecognized word or words ].
If the heat continues you will hardly feel like taking the journey to me. It is comfortable after you arrive however, if that will spur you on!
Annie Fields.
The best afternoon train leaves Boston at 4.30. It is quicker than the others.
Notes
1897: During the summer of 1897, the 9th fell on Friday in July. And see Sarah Orne Jewett to Lilian Aldrich of 9 July.
Sarah: Sarah Orne Jewett. See Key to Correspondents.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University: Thomas Bailey Aldrich Papers, MS Am 1429, Box 6, Items 1446-1538. Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Lilian Woodman Aldrich
[ Begin letterhead ]
South Berwick.
Maine.
[ End letterhead ]
and Madame Blanc's* sudden going away. She meant to go with us at first and we have had so great a journey in mind all the spring! I thought it would be good for all of us to have the change, especially for my sister and Theodore.* Now, with
all the places taken, & rooms spoken for and all we mean to start tomorrow. Theodore and Mary send you their love and thanks with mine, and say that it is a pleasure to have such a delightful invitation. I well remember how pleasant it is at Ponkapog and I hope that it will not be long before I see the dear old place
again. Madame Blanc was so sorry not to see you --------
You and T.B.* were being looked for early this week from the hill at Manchester:* I do hope that you are going down?
Sarah O. Jewett
Notes
Madame Blanc: Marie Thérèse de Solms Blanc. See Key to Correspondents.
sister and Theodore: Mary Rice Jewett and Theodore Jewett Eastman. See Key to Correspondents.
T.B.: Thomas Bailey Aldrich. See Key to Correspondents.
Manchester: Jewett implies that Annie Adams Fields is hoping to see the Aldriches at her summer cottage in Manchester by the Sea, MA. See Key to Correspondents.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library, Harvard University, Cambridge, Mass. Thomas Bailey Aldrich Papers, 119 letters of Thomas Bailey and Lilian Woodman Aldrich, 1837-1926. MS Am 1429 (117). Transcribed and annotated by Terry Heller, Coe College.
At the bottom left of page one, in another hand, is a circled number: 2755.
Sarah Wyman Whitman to Sarah Orne Jewett
[ 14 July 1897 ]*
Ah darling, one word with you for love's sake this drowsy morning.
Mrs Lawrence* & my guests one & all came away from the Hilltop full of [ melodius so spelled ] [ images ? ] & I blessed you & A.F.* for such
2
a generous portion of life & Nature & Society! -- I think this year I am more deeply aware than ever before of what is going on at the Centre -- that is of the real thing in reality. From which statement I do not want you to think this a
3
psychological disquisition: but just an allusion to a state of feeling.
I wish I could tell you what this particular day (& many others) is like. Its like being set to deal with elements as varied as the gift in Pandora's box.* I might
4
summarize by enumeration for illustration.
Mrs. Lawrence,
Victor's necessities,
Jack's disappearance,*
A sick servant,
People who are coming.
And dont come,
People who are not coming.
and come,
Together with
5
personal impressions
and predilections
together with inveterate
tendencies, & the law of diminishing returns.
___________________
But I cannot write to send you catalogues, & forbear.
Tell me if it is for Quebec: & of all that concernsyou: and my love to Theodore (to whom it has been sent already by letter --) and to your sister*
Notes
14 July 1897: This is the date given to this letter in Letters of Sarah Wyman Whitman (1907).
Mrs Lawrence: Mrs. Lawrence almost certainly is Elizabeth Chapman, widow of T. Bigelow Lawrence. One of Whitman's correspondents, she was the subject of E.L., the Bread Box Papers: The High Life of a Dazzling Victorian Lady: a Biography of Elizabeth Chapman Lawrence (1983) by Helen Hartman Gemmill. Daughter of Henry Chapman (1804-1891), a Pennsylvania congressman, she was a popular and cosmopolitan woman who, after her marriage, moved in the same circles as Annie Fields and Jewett.
A.F. Annie Adams Fields. See Key to Correspondents. Her summer home in Manchester-by-the-Sea, MA, was located on Thunderbolt Hill.
Pandora's Box: In Greek mythology, Pandora was the first woman on earth, sent by the gods to counteract Prometheus's gift of fire. She was given a box and warned never to open it; when she succumbed to curiosity, she let loose all of the misfortunes that humans suffer.
Victor ... Jack: Victor almost certainly is Victor Whitman Knauth (1895-1977), Whitman's grand-nephew, a twin son of her husband's niece, Mary Iles Whitman Knauth.
Jack is the American author, John Jay Chapman (1862-1933). Trained at Harvard Law School, he practiced law in New York City while achieving distinction as an essayist. He was for a few years editor of the journal, The Political Nursery (1897-1901). Whitman came to know him when he married her protégée, Minna Elisa Timmins (1861 - 25 January 1897) in 1889. Timmins was the adopted child of Martin Brimmer (1829 - 1926), first director of the Boston Museum of Fine Arts. Chapman and Timmins had three children.
Chapman remarried in April 1898, to Elizabeth Astor Winthrop Chanler (1866-1937).
Theodore ... sister: Theodore Jewett Eastman and Mary Rice Jewett. See Key to Correspondents.
Sw: Whitman varies in this signature from her typical long line beneath the initials. Instead she draws an extended >.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University. Whitman, Sarah (Wyman) 1842-1904. 92 letters; [1884]-[1903] & [n.d.] Jewett, Sarah Orne, 1849-1909. Sarah Orne Jewett additional correspondence, 1868-1930. MS Am 1743.1 -107. Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Transcription from Letters of Sarah Wyman Whitman (1907)
Part of this letter appeared on pp. 95-6.
July 14, 1897. Old Place.
I think this year I am more deeply
aware than ever before of what is going on at the Centre, that
is of the real thing in reality. From which statement I do not
want you to think this a psychological disquisition, but just an
allusion to a state of feeling.
I wish I could tell you what this
particular day (and many others) is like. It's like being set to
deal with elements as varied as the gift in Pandora's box. I
might summarize by enumeration for illustration.
Mrs. Lawrence,
Victor's necessities,
Jack's disappearance,
A sick servant,
People who are coming and don't come,
People who are not coming and come,
But I cannot write to send you catalogues and forbear.
Annie Adams Fields to Lilian and Thomas Bailey Aldrich
July 18th
[ 1897 ]*
You say; may we come by and by! Surely; and with the greatest pleasure, on or after the 24th.
The best afternoon train is at 4.30; there is a morning train leaving here at 10.20.
I wish copies of The Ode!* I have not one to my back!!
Notes
1897: This date in brackets appears top right in another hand. As this was the year in which the Shaw Memorial was dedicated, I believe this date is correct.
The Ode: Aldrich's best-remembered ode was "The Shaw Memorial Ode," written for the dedication of the Robert Gould Shaw Memorial on the Boston Common on 31 May 1897.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University: Thomas Bailey Aldrich Papers, MS Am 1429, Box 6, Items 1446-1538. Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Elizabeth Cabot Cary Agassiz to Sarah Orne Jewett
Nahant.
Dear Sarah
A little absence from home has prevented me from writing before -- Alas [ our scholarships ? ] are few (only three in all) and I am afraid none vacant. There are two or three good people who help me from time to time in this [ today ? ] -- Miss ^Ellen^ Mason who returns from Europe in August is one -- Miss Hovey is another -- She has one or two
very promising students at Radcliffe now. She might perhaps give partial aid at least.
I do not know whether Miss [ Searles ? ]* is a [ person ? ] to whom help in this way can be offered --
I will direct a circular to be sent you from the office -- and will write Mr. Gilman* about
the case. It is just possible he may know of some [ 2 unrecognized words ] if the scholarships are taken up.
Yes -- it is very helpful & [ restful ? ] to be here and I hope to go back to Cambridge [ unrecognized word ] for the winter work. Good-bye with much love from your affectionate friend
Notes
1897: Almost certainly, this letter was composed during Agassiz's active presidency of Radcliffe College, which began in 1894, but before the death of Marian Hovey in 1898. I have placed it in 1897 arbitrarily, on the ground that this should be close to the correct date.
The handwriting in my photocopy is light and difficult to transcribe. There are many more guesses here than those noted in brackets. A reader needing a more certain transcription should consult the manuscript.
Mason ... Hovey: For Ellen Mason, see Key to Correspondents.
Miss Marian Hovey (1836-1898) was a benefactor of Radcliffe. Woman's Column 1899 says she was a life-long invalid who donated women's gymnasiums to several colleges and who was a supporter of woman suffrage. Find a Grave.
Searles: This transcription is uncertain, and this person has not yet been identified.
Gilman: Probably this is Arthur Gilman. See Stella Scott Gilman in Key to Correspondents.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University: Sarah Orne Jewett Correspondence I, Letters to Sarah Orne Jewett. bMS Am 1743 (2).
This transcription is from a photocopy held by the Maine Women Writer's Collection, University of New England, Box 2, Folder 99, Burton Trafton Jewett Research Collection.
Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Annie Adams Fields
[ Summer 1897 ]*
A nice rainy day and I hope you wont have to go out! I am going to be very busy and try to get a number of things done that weigh down my conscience).
I have* had a time lately when it seems impossible to do anything with a pen and ink -- I think that I am going to spin on as usual and then -- it stops -- But
[ Page 2 ]
(Yesterday I went sedately to church in the morning and in the afternoon Mary* and I went a long distance over hill and dale to see a hut in the woods that Stubby* and a friend have been bending their energies to. It was a beautiful hemlock house Fuffatee -- I told Stubs that
[ Page 3 ]
some day we should have to build you a hemlock house down in the woods; it would be so pretty for Fuffatee -- a green bower -- you would call it, but we a hemlock hut! Mary just came by and desired me to tell you what serene visitor we have in Stubby who has now [ ensued ? ] since yesterday morning for a visit as if we lived in Vermont and he hadnt seen us for some months -- -- I daresay he will stay with Mary while I am gone. Dear Mouse I
[ Page 4 ]
didn't mean to "be to" the Fair this year{.} I thought that it was to be Wednesday -- it seems to me as if I should see all the people I knew at one fell swoop and somehow I dont quite get my courage up to that. If I had been working right along with it it would be different. I must send you a shopping -- but we can talk over this plan when I get to you which I now hope will be Wednesday. I send this perfectly delightful [ letter corrected ] from Mabel.* It really sounds better -- but is not readable aloud to the
general public on account of various personalities. It is so funny at the end about "hops is nothing to my state of mind" about the other Sarah Jewett!!* Goodbye darling & love to Alice* --
from S.O.J.
| 6
Scissors
$1.80 6 Knives 1.30 6 Court plaster .20 Rubber straps .28 Labels .30 6 Thimbles .60 4.48 |
You had better see whether you can afford the stylograph.* I should think the penholders would do -- |
| 6) 4.48 42 28 24 4 |
(74 + Say 75 cents for these things. I could not get short handled penholders but those will cost little. |
Notes
Summer 1897: This tentative date is a reasoned guess. That Theodore Jewett Eastman is visiting and building a hemlock house with a friend suggests that he is away at school normally, but probably not yet in college. That he is staying with his aunts suggests that this is after the death of his mother in April of 1897. Jewett and Fields were in Europe in 1898. It is possible this letter is from 1899 or 1900, but 1897 seems more likely.
Parenthesis marks in this manuscript were penciled by Fields.
Fuff: Nickname for Annie Adams Fields. Later in the letter she uses another such nickname -- Mouse. See Key to Correspondents.
I have: Fields has penciled an insertion before these words: "Dearest".
P. Lawson: Pinny Lawson (Pinny / Pin) was an affectionate nickname for Jewett, used by her and Annie Fields. See Key to Correspondents.
Mary: Mary Rice Jewett. See Key to Correspondents.
Stubby: Theodore Jewett Eastman. See Key to Correspondents.
Mabel: Mabel Lowell Burnett, daughter of James Russell Lowell. See Key to Correspondents.
margins of page 1: Uncharacteristically, Jewett has filled the margins of this page, writing up the left margin, across the top margin, and then again up the right margin.
other Sarah Jewett: Jewett refers to her contemporary, the actress Sara Jewett (1847-1899). Note that the actresses career ended because of failing health in 1883.
Alice: This could be Alice Longfellow or Alice Greenwood Howe. See Key to Correspondents.
Possibly another page: This page appears in the Houghton folder after the above letter. In fact, there is no other circumstance to connect it with this letter except that Jewett says in the letter that she will have to send Fields shopping, presumably for items to be resold in some form at the fair she mentions. This may, then, be a list of the items Jewett would like Fields to purchase.
This seems to be the top half of a torn sheet; the bottom of the page appears torn and uneven.
I have attempted to imitate the appearance of text on the page, which is arranged in blocks. Parenthesis marks on this page are by Jewett.
stylograph: The stylographic pen is an early version of a fountain pen, precursor to the ball-point pen. Like a fountain pen, a stylographic stores ink in a reservoir, feeding it to the tip or nub as one writes or draws.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University. Jewett, Sarah Orne, 1849-1909. Annie Fields (Adams) 1834-1915, recipient. 194 letters; 1877-1909 & [n.d.] Sarah Orne Jewett correspondence, 1861-1930. MS Am 1743 (255). Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Mary Rice Jewett
Manchester Sunday
[ Summer 1897 ]*
Dear Mary
I am so sorry to miss Billy’s* visit. I had unusual leanings toward going home with Stubby* as I think I said. I do hope that you have had a good Sunday with him and I hope that you stepped yourself some where both yesterday and today. You might speak at length of the visit. I do wish that I had seen him. Tell Stubs that yesterday we had a great call from Mr. Black and Mrs. Peters* and tea on the back piazza. Mrs. Black* was reported none the worse for a great social function. Mrs. Wigglesworth* also happened along, and also Mrs. Feirson, Harry Lyman’s aunt.* She said that Harry was getting up a dining club, so if there are difficulties in going to Memorial* there may be none in that direction. She mentioned that Harry was slow with his Book, so funny and outspoken as she always is.
I didn’t go down the hill even yesterday, it was so pleasant and I had things to do. We are still reading the Jowett book* -- it is one of Mrs. Cabot’s cut-up books* so we change pieces, A.F.* being ‘the one’ who got the start and as she reads slower than I, I generally have a little vacation between! I am going to order a copy sent home. I know that you will perfectly delight in it. I want to mark something on every page. How nice to take Mrs. Whitehead and Sarah Leah!* they must have had a beautilly [ so transcribed ] time. Where is the Furber road* so called? I have been trying to think. Oh yes I know all of a sudden!! but I forgot ‘Jim’:* we usually speak both his names at once and I was wondering in my mind up and down the other side of the river. Your sister is going back and her intellects is failing fast.
You never speaked about Susan H.P.H. Haven and Georgina being foolish not to come and see Cousin Mary Black and Nixon* ……..
Only think of Mary Maynadiers* dying! What will they do without her? It always seemed as if her family were quite unworthy of her, but I may be wrong. I felt very sorry to see that she is dead. I met her one day in the train about a year ago and we had a very nice time. Good bye with much love to you and Stubby from
I hope to get home by Wednesday or Thursday
Notes
Summer 1897: A handwritten note on this
transcription reads: 189-. This tentative date is
supported by several circumstances in the letter, that Jewett is
concerned about where her nephew Theodore will eat at Harvard,
where he began studies in the fall of 1897, that she is reading
a life of Jowett published that year, and that she reports the
death of Mary Maynadier, which also occurred that year.
Billy’s: Billy has not been identified. Possibly he is Jewett's distant cousin William Elbert Furber, son of Jewett correspondent, Cynthia Elvira Irwin Furber.
Stubby: Theodore Jewett Eastman. See Key to Correspondents.
Mr. Black... Mrs. Peters ... Mrs. Black: The
Blacks seem likely to be Mary E. Peters Black (1816-1902) and
her son, George Nixon Black, Jr. (1842-1928). The son was
a prominent philanthropist and the builder of Kragsyde
(1883–85, demolished 1929), "a Shingle Style mansion designed by
the Boston architectural firm of Peabody & Stearns and built
at Manchester-by-the-Sea, Massachusetts, with landscaping
by the Olmsted firm.
Mrs. Peters may be a relative of the Blacks,
given Mrs. Black's maiden name. Possibly, Aravesta Huckins
Peters (1831-1910), widow of Mrs. Black's brother, Charles
Peters, was a summer visitor.
Mrs. Wigglesworth: Wigglesworth was a prominent
name in 19th-century Massachusetts. Among the likely
visitors at Annie's Manchester home would have been Sarah Willard Wigglesworth (1848-1928),
widow of Dr. Edward Wigglesworth (1840-1896)
and Mary C. Dixwell Wigglesworth (1855-1951),
wife of George Wigglesworth (1855-1930).
His parents were Theodore Lyman (1833-1897) and Elizabeth Russell (1836-1911).
The name "Feirson" is virtually unknown, and, in fact, Jewett must have written"Peirson," meaning Emily Russell Peirson (1843-1908), wife of Charles Lawrence Peirson -- sometimes spelled Pierson -- (1834-1920), both of whom were residents of the Manchester area.
According to a genealogy of the Russell Family (p. 72), George R. Russell & Sarah Parkman Russell were the parents of Elizabeth Russell and Emily Russell, making Emily Russell Peirson Harry Lyman's aunt.
Memorial: Memorial Hall at Harvard University was the main dining commons for about 50 years following the building's dedication in 1874.
Jowett book ... one of Mrs. Cabot’s cut-up books:
Benjamin
Jowett
(1817-1893),
was
Master
of
Balliol
College,
Oxford University, and Regius professor of Greek. It is almost
certain that Jewett was reading The Life and Letters of
Benjamin Jowett (1897) by Evelyn Abbott and Lewis
Campbell. Jewett mentions the book in a letter to Sarah
Wyman Whitman believed to have been composed in the summer of
1897.
Susan Burley Cabot. See Key
to
Correspondents.
Mrs. Whitehead and Sarah Leah: John B. Whitehead
(1852-1942), tailor, operated a clothing store and was a Jewett
neighbor in South Berwick. Whether his wife is the Mrs.
Whitehead mentioned here is not yet known.
Sarah Leah, apparently of South Berwick,
worked as Jewett's typist and is mentioned in several
letters. However no details about her identity have been
discovered as of this writing.
the Furber road ... ‘Jim’: These
references are unknown. However, relatives of Jewett's
family, Henry Furber, Senior and Junior, at various times had
resided in nearby Somersworth, NH, and at the time of this
letter, it would not be surprising if there were a Furber Road
in the area.
Susan H.P.H. Haven and Georgina ... Cousin Mary Black and
Nixon: Richard Cary identifies Susan Hamilton
Peters Haven (Mrs. George Wallis Haven), mother of Georgina
Halliburton, who was a descendant of the John Haggins who built
and originally occupied the Jewett house in South
Berwick. See Georgina Halliburton in Key
to
Correspondents.
Nixon probably is George Nixon Black, Jr.
(see above). Cousin Mary Black may be his mother,
but this is uncertain. That Susan Haven shares her maiden
name with Mrs. Black makes it reasonable to suppose that they
are cousins, but this has not been established.
This text is from transcriptions from mixed repositories in the Maine Women Writer's Collection, University of New England, Letters from Sarah Orne Jewett, 1875-1890, Folder 73, Burton Trafton Jewett Research Collection. For more information about the individual transcription, contact the Maine Women Writers Collection. Preparation by Linda Heller. Notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Miss Lowell
Thursday [Summer 1897]*
My dear Miss Lowell*
It makes me very sorry to have to decline your most kind invitation for Saturday the seventeenth, but Mrs. Fields* and I have made a plan to go to the country for a while on Tuesday. I should like to see dear Katie Dunham* again, -- Please tell her with my love that I hope we may not miss her altogether! -- and indeed I should like to see you
(having quite missed you of late! -- and to go to [ unrecognized name: Sevenels ? Levenels ? ]*
Sarah O. Jewett
Miss Lowell: This person remains unidentified, though she may be Georgina Lowell. See Key to Correspondents.
Mrs. Fields: Annie Adams Fields. See Key to Correspondents.
Katie Dunham: Katie/Katy Dunham was one of the four Dunham sisters, daughters of James Dunham of New York. Katy and her sisters -- Helen, Etta, and Grace -- were subjects of 1892 portraits by John Singer Sargent. Helen married Theodore Holmes Spicer (1860-1935) of London, England, in 1910. For a little more information about this family, see Donna M. Lucey, Sargent's Women: Four Lives Behind the Canvas (2017).
Levenels: The difficulty of transcription renders impossible identifying this item.
This manuscript of this letter is held by Archives and Special Collections, Amherst College Library, in the Miscellaneous Manuscripts Collection. Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Mary Rice Jewett
Tuesday morning
[ August 1897 ]*
Dear Mary
The wind is now north east but I dont mind except as it may turn out to be the last of august storm and prevent A.F.* from coming home with me tomorrow. I mean to get there at six as that is the quickest way, at least after early morning, but I couldn’t be so long as I was traveling to Little Boars Head* that day which makes me smile when ever I think of it. I s’pose all would have been well if I had set forth a little earlier from here but 8.51 seemed early enough at the time, considering that railroad facilities seemed to be offered.
Your letty has just come with all the lettys and there are those who have sat by and had to share them and I have had a share of hers with an agreeable letty from Sister Sarah as is at Ripton at the Bread Load [so transcribed. Intended Loaf?] Inn and coming to Louisa’s* in September. How beautiful Aunt Helen’s letter is! --- I am so glad that I wrote to Little Mary* a good long letter since I have been here. I cant help thinking that it is a wonder she has held out as long as she has poor little thing. I dont believe that it will be heart breaking to take her little Mary & go to Colorado so ar [so transcribed. Intended far?] as that is concerned. Yesterday we took the train to Prides and went to see R. Loring* down their lovely avenue, and then to Mrs. Cabots. Katy* met us wreathed in smiles and said discreetly that “Mrs. Cabot was out driving”! and next moment she rolled up in the Victoria if you please! with a grand cloak on her and a lofty grey bonnet which I spoke of almost too irreverent, but she laughed and was so cheerful. Her little cheerful Dr. Jackson* does well by her I must say, but I cannot describe the pageant it being so handsome and impressive Mary. She sits way back like a Duchess in Hyde Park* as you might know, but we must not forget that she is an eminent Republican. Do have Sarah Fanny* home instantly: ask Stubby* to urge the matter, or she will be soft. I hope she will be well grained and high stepping for I shall need to ply her in the Dimmycrat wagon* so no more at present from
I should love to have a present of the Jowett* more than anything! I feel as I had known the dear old man. all [so transcribed] his life and as if he had died only yesterday when I finished the book. You get so attached to him -- a real old Parson Allen* in some ways.
Notes
August 1897: A handwritten note on this
transcription reads: 189-. This date is based upon Jewett
mentioning that September is coming soon and that she has been
reading a biography of Jowett, a fact she mentions in other
letters thought to be be composed in the summer of 1897.
A.F.: Annie Adams Fields. See Key
to
Correspondents.
Little Boars Head: Location of the Cove, summer home of Charles H. Bell and family. See Key to Correspondents.
Sister Sarah ...Bread Load Inn ... Louisa’s: Annie Fields's sister was Sarah Holland Adams. Louisa presumably is Louisa Dresel. See Fields and Dresel in Key to Correspondents. The Bread Loaf Inn is in Ripton, VT.
Aunt Helen’s ... Little Mary: Aunt Helen probably is Mrs. Helen Williams Gilman. Little Mary has not been identified, but it is possible she is the youngest daughter of Alice Dunlap Gilman. See Key to Correspondents.
Prides and went to see R. Loring: Jewett refers to Prides Crossing, a residence of the Caleb Loring family. As there are no members of that family with the first initial R, it seems likely that the transcriber has misread a K, for Jewett's friend Katharine Loring. See Key to Correspondents.
Mrs. Cabots ... Katy: Susan Burley Cabot. See Key
to
Correspondents. Presumably, Katy is an employee of Mrs.
Cabot, but this is not certain. Further identification is
welcome.
Dr. Jackson: This must be speculative. Dr. Henry
Jackson (died after 1924) was a resident of the Back Bay area of Boston at the turn of the
twentieth century. His wife was Lucy Rice Jackson
(d.1924).
Duchess in Hyde Park: Hyde Park in 19th-century London was a
favorite place for aristocrats and the wealthy to take drives in
open carriages, to visit, see and be seen.
Sarah Fanny: This seems to be a Jewett family
horse, with perhaps a play on the name Sarafina.. More
information is welcome.
Stubby: Theodore Jewett Eastman. See Key to Correspondents.
Dimmycrat wagon: Wiktionary says a democrat
wagon is "a light flatbed farm wagon or ranch wagon that has two
or more seats and is usually drawn by one or sometimes two
horses."
Jowett: Benjamin Jowett (1817-1893), was Master
of Balliol College, Oxford University, and Regius professor of
Greek. It is almost certain that Jewett was reading The Life
and Letters of Benjamin Jowett (1897) by Evelyn Abbott and
Lewis Campbell. Jewett mentions reading the book in other
letters believed to have been composed in the summer of 1897.
Parson Allen: Jewett may refer to Rev. Benjamin
Russell Allen (1805-1872), a much-loved Congregational minister
who had served 12 years (1842-1854) in South Berwick and
remained a Jewett family friend until his death. See
Jewett's description of him in her diary entry for 17 June 1872.
3 August [ 1897 ]*
I have received from Mlle Blaze de Bury* the copy of a book of Essays of which we talked somewhat when you were at Manchester. She calls it French Romancers and Essayists. As I look it through I must say that I believe more than ever that
it would make a really delightful and 'popular' book. It deals necessarily with so many live subjects and with those French writers (for the most part) who are almost as interesting here as in France itself.
-- But upon this the House must decide and not I!
I only wish to say that
if you see fit to publish it I shall be glad to help in any way in my power -- I think that it is just possible [ you corrected ] may have decided against the book altogether since I saw you, so that I hesitate about troubling you or Mr. Mifflin* unnecessarily with the copy, but if you will let me know, I can send the little package
to you at once by first express.
S. O. Jewett.
Notes
1897: Below Jewett's date, someone has noted [ 1899 ]. However, this must be incorrect, because the book Jewett commends to Page in this letter was published by Houghton Mifflin in 1898. I have dated the letter in 1897 because Jewett could not have composed it in 1898, when she was in Europe in August, and there is evidence to suggest that she visited in Prides Crossing, MA in August of 1897 -- see her letter to Mary Rice Jewett tentatively dated August 1897.
In the upper left corner of page 1 is penciled a 3 inside an unclosed circle.
Two holes have been punched into the left margin of page 2, each of which partially obscures the text. Below Jewett's signature on p. 4 appear the initials WHP for Walter Hines Page. See Key to Correspondents.
Mlle Blaze de Bury: Anne Emilie Rose Yetta Blaze de Bury (c. 1840 - 1902) is the author of French Literature Today: A Study of the Principal Romancers and Essayists (Houghton Mifflin 1898). She was the daughter of Marie Pauline Rose (Stuart) Blaze de Bury (1813 - 1894 ). The senior Blaze de Bury was born in Scotland and moved to France at an early age. She became a writer of fiction and essays in French and in English, publishing sometimes under the name, Arthur Dudley. See also Stanford Companion to Victorian Fiction p. 71 and Library of Congress.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University in Houghton Mifflin Company correspondence and records, 1832-1944, Jewett, Sarah Orne, 1849-1909. 68 letters from; 1870-1907 and [n.d.]. MS Am 1925 (962). Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Marie Thérèse de Solms Blanc to Annie Adams Fields
This letter was composed in French; a transcription follows the translation.
In a hurry, dear Annie! -- If you want rugs,* I would say to act as soon as possible, for half already are gone, and the rest attract amateur buyers every day -- Included is the list. I have just finished my move, which was very tiring. Most of my furniture
has gone to La Ferté, and the rest is with Mme. Coignet.* I arranged with particular care your bedroom and one for Sarah;* I can just see both of you there. Did I ever tell you that the shop-keeper who framed your portrait stood in ecstasy before the photograph, exclaiming: -- Oh, my goodness! this is
I recently saw Miss Monroe,* sister of the poet; both are at
[ Page 4 ]
the pleasure of seeing Mrs. Judah of Memphis, a kind woman friend of Miss French.* Did you get your hats? Has Sarah read the pettiness of Mr. [ Vallier or Villier ] about Puvis de Chavannes?* I embrace you both tenderly.
[ Cross-written down the left side of page 4 ]
[ Cross-written up the right side, top half of the page 4 ]
How is Mrs. Cabot?*
Tell Sarah that the shirtwaist is arranged admirably for me. --
My son* is in the middle of the Russian holidays in St. Petersburg. Then there is a geological congress. Then a stay in the countryside at the estate of Prince Khalkoff.* Then off for a tour in Siberia with the Prince, who is minister of public works.
Notes
1897: With this letter is an envelope presumably associated with it, addressed to Mrs. J. Fields at Manchester by the Sea. It appears to be cancelled at La Ferté on 4 August 1897.
Blanc had visited in the U.S. in the summer, but was suddenly called home in July. See Sarah Orne Jewett to Lilian Aldrich of 13 July.
rugs: Blanc may refer to these same rugs in her letter to Fields of 3 September 1897.
Mme. Coignet: French moral philosopher, educator and activist, Clarisse Coignet (1823-1918).
Sarah: Sarah Orne Jewett. See Key to Correspondents.
Mme. Récamier: Probably Blanc refers to the famous French socialite and salonnière, Jeanne Françoise Julie Adélaïde Récamier (1777-1849). She had a reputation for personal beauty and modesty.
Miss Monroe: American poet and editor, Harriet Monroe (1860-1936) was a founder and long-time editor of Poetry magazine. Miss Monroe, her sister, was Dora Louise Monroe (1857-1913), who in 1882 married Chicago architect John Wellborn Root (1850-1891).
Rousseau: Swiss-born French author and philosopher, Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778).
Mrs. Judah ... Miss French: American author, Alice French, who published as Octave Thanet. See Key to Correspondents. She was a member of the Woman's Club of Memphis, TN, of which Mary Jameson Judah was the founder and first president. See The History of the Woman's Club Movement in America (1898), by Jane Cunningham Croly, pp. 1065-6..
Puvis de Chavannes: French painter, Pierre Puvis de Chavannes (1824-1898).
Cecelia Waern, in "Puvis de Chavannes in Boston," Atlantic 79 (1896) 251-7, praised the nine panels by Puvis de Chavannes recently completed for the Boston Public Library. Possibly the judgment to which Blanc refers relates to the Boston murals.
Vallier/Villier has not yet been identified.
Mme. de Beaulaincourt: Sophie de Castellane, Marquise de Contades, then Beaulaincourt, Countess Marles (1818- 25 December 1904) was a writer and kept a salon.
Mrs. Cabot: This name is obscured in the MS, and remains somewhat uncertain. Probably, though, Blanc refers to Susan Burley Cabot. See Key to Correspondents.
My son: Édouard Blanc (1858-1923). See Blanc in Key to Correspondents.
Prince Khalkoff: The various spellings of Russian names complicate identifying this person.
Mikhail Ivanovich Khilkov (1834-1909) was a Russian railroad executive, who served the Russian government in various capacities, notably as Minister of Public Works and Railways under Czar Nicholas II, appointed in 1895.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Huntington Library, San Marino, CA, in the James T. Fields Papers and Addenda mss FI 1-5637, Box 5. Transcription, translation and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College, with essential assistance from Jeannine Hammond, Professor of French, Emerita, at Coe College.
Transcription
Blanc sometimes abbreviates "pour" to "pr" and "vous" to "vs." Such instances in this letter are rendered as "pour" and "vous."
À la hâte, chère
Annie! -- Si vous
voulez des tapis,
il faudrait me
le dire le plus
tôt possible, car
la moitié est déjà
enlevée et le reste
trouve des amateurs
tous les jours --
Voici la liste.
Je viens d'achever
mon déménagement
ce qui est une
grosse fatigue.
La plupart de mes
meubles sont
transportés à La Ferté{,}
le reste chez Mme
Coignet. J'ai arrangé
avec un soin
particulaire votre
chambre et celle
de Sarah; il me
semble déjà vous
y voir. Vous ai-je
jamais dit que
l'encadreur de votre
portrait était resté
en extase devant
cette photographie, en
s'écriant: -- Ah! par
exemple, voilà une
belle personne! --
Si vous êtes le moins
du monde comme
Mme. Récamier qui
faisait plus de
cas de l'admiration
à bouche ouverte
des petits [ amoureux ? ]
dans la rue que
des compliments
des hommes du
monde, ceci vous
touchera.
J'ai vu dernièrement
Miss Monroe soeur
de la poëtesse; elles
sont toutes deux à
Ermenonville dans
le délicieux pays où
Rousseau écrivit
de si belles pages et
fut enterré sous
les saules. Quand elles
en iront je les
chargerai d'une
commission pour
vous. J'ai eu aussi
le plaisir de voir Mrs
Judah de Memphis, une
aimable femme amie
de Miss French. Avez-
vous reçu vos chapeaux?
Sarah a-t-elle [ lu ? ]
[ la mesquinerie de M. Vallier or Villier ? ]
sur Puvis de Chavannes?
Je vous embrasse tendrement
toutes les deux.
Mme de Beaulaincourt
ravie de son [ unrecognized word ] à [ unrecognized location ] {;}
vous écrira dès que ses yeux très
malades le lui permettront{.}
Comment va Mme [ Cabot ? ]?
Dites à Sarah que
la waist est arrangée
admirablement
pour moi. ---
Mon fils est en pleines fêtes
russes à Petersbourg.
Puis le congrès de géologie.
Puis une visite à la campagne
chez le Prince Khalkoff.
Puis départ pour une
tournée en Sibérie avec
ce dernier qui est ministre
des travaux publics.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Sara Norton
August 5, 1897.
Just at this moment, instead of going on with my proper work of writing, I find that I wish to talk to you. This is partly because I dreamed about you and feel quite as if I had seen you in the night. I am at Mrs. Cabot's*, -- my old friend's, -- and somehow it is a very dear week. She has been ill ever since I came on Saturday,* but not so ill as to give her much pain or me any real anxiety. I sit in her room and talk and read and watch the sails go in and out of harbor, and she speaks wisely from her comfortable great bed while we have a comfortable sense of pleasure in being together. I am very fond of this dear old friend, and I always love to be with her. Besides, it is a house unlike any other, with a sense of space and time and uninterruptedness, which as you know isn't so easy to find in this part of the world. One hates to waste a moment in trivial occupations -- you might write an epic poem at Mrs. Cabot's -- that is, if you might write it anywhere!
I think of the old house at home* as I write this so gayly, and to tell the truth, I wish that you and I were there together. If we were there we should see the pink hollyhocks in the garden and read together a good deal. I wish that my pretty dream were all true! but one finds true companionship in dreams -- as I knew last night.
Dear child, I shall be so glad to see
you again. I have missed you sadly this summer in spite of your
letters, -- in spite of time and space counting for so little in
friendship!
Notes
Saturday: August 5 fell on a Thursday in 1897.at Mrs. Cabot's: Susan Burley Cabot; See Correspondents. Cabot lived at Misselwood on Hale Street in the town of Beverly, near Pride's Crossing, on the coast between Boston and Manchester-by-the-Sea. Richard Cary notes that Louisa Dresel, another correspondent, and her family lived nearby.
old house at home: Jewett is thinking of her family home in South Berwick.
This letter appears in Annie Fields, Letters of Sarah Orne Jewett (1911), Transcribed by Annie Adams Fields, with notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
G. B. Perry to Sarah Orne Jewett
August 7, 1897
My dear Cousin Sarah
Absolution is always granted by 'The Church' after due confession, and in extreme penance, my good conscience will certainly not be most exacting to a poor penitent who pleads for mercy and forgiveness in [ his ? ]* long delinquency [ which ? ] you the [ unrecognized word ] of a pretty book* and [ unrecognized word ] thanks not only for the book itself but for the kind remembrance of one so long [ an ? ] [ unrecognized word ], and
2
in consequence almost a [ stranger ? ] to [ kith and kin ? ] --
My good wife has read it [ and enjoyed the perusal very much but as she is also from Maine, can also perhaps appreciate the characters better than myself for whom the pleasure must be postponed a few days longer -- How an idle man should be the busiest person in the world is a strange contradiction but it is [ often ? ] so, and it is true in my case -- Every person [ possesses ? ] [ Much text I cannot decipher follows. ]*
[ The ] summer season here has thus far been very good for those fond of aquatic sports but not so ....
G B P*
Notes
Letterhead figure: Unfortunately, my photograph of the figure is unclear. There is a bird, perhaps a phoenix, over a banner with a Latin phrase. I cannot read the phrase.
his: Perry's handwriting is extremely challenging. I have guessed at many more words in this letter than I have indicated, and I have failed to make much sense of the first page.
book: At the time of this letter, Jewett's most recent book was The Country of the Pointed Firs (1896).
follows: From this point, most of the rest of pages 2 and 3 are too difficult for me to invest time in puzzling them out. I have transcribed only a few sentences that I can read with at least a little confidence.
G B P: The identity of this person is not yet known. Houghton archives have speculated that the surname is Perry, probably because he identified himself as Jewett's cousin, her mother being from the Perry family of Exeter, NH. The prominent Perry family in Rhode Island was large. I have located several men named George Babcock Perry, but all of those died before 1897.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University, Cambridge, MA. Sarah Orne Jewett Correspondence, bMS Am 1743 Box 4, Item 176 . I. Letters to Sarah Orne Jewett.
Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
F. E. Latham to Sarah Orne Jewett
Attorney-at-Law
S. O. Jewett;
South Berwick,Maine.
Replying to yours of recent date relative to the interest of Nancy Brumfield,* due July [ ist so it appears ] would say; I hardly think I shall be able to collect same until harvest is over and she can realize some money from her crop, but she will certainly pay at the earliest possible moment and within the next thirty days; will that be satisfactory*
F. E. Latham.*
Notes
Brumfield: The identity of this person is not known, nor have details of this financial arrangement yet come to light.
satisfactory: There may be a question mark after this word, but the marks look like this: ' ^ .
Latham: Further information about Latham has not yet been discovered.
The typescript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University, Cambridge, MA. bMS Am 1743 Box 3, Item 130 I. Letters to Sarah Orne Jewett.
Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Wyman Whitman to Sarah Orne Jewett
Darling: I am here and I send you love -- and perhaps you would like to know that it is raining in vast torrents, but that it doesn't make any difference because Morton & Fanny Prince & the Endicotts & W. James & Hodg-
[ Page 2 ]
[ Page 3 ]
I am glad to get for a moment off rails which have
more persistent grip in them than usual even.
When I saw A.F.* we talked of
my writing as to when I could come over -- & then when I
wrote I spoke only of you all coming to me, which I hope will
occur! To you I can say that Sunday Evening might be a
free time -- but this is only to you in case
of its coming to your knowledge as a convenience.
And your [ bringing Annie ? ] is what I look for.
[ Page 4 ]
I take one more scrap to [ intended say ? ] I love you on.
Notes
1897: The envelope associated with this letter is addressed to Jewett at Manchester, MA, cancelled on 11 August 1897.
Morton & Fanny Prince & the Endicotts & W. James & Hodgson ... Bryers: Probably Whitman refers to American physician and psychologist, Dr. Morton Prince (1854-1929) and his wife, Fannie Lithgow Payson. Mrs. Prince was connected with the Endicott family. The Endicotts at Bar Harbor, ME in 1897, probably were the American politician William C. Endicott (1826-1900) and his wife, Ellen Peabody (1833-1927). For American philosopher William James, see Key to Correspondents.
Hodgson and the Bryers have not yet been identified, but Robert Mainfort and Mary Kwas (University of Arkansas) speculate that he may be British poet Ralph Hodgson (1871-1962).
A. F.: Annie Adams Fields. See Key to Correspondents.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University. Whitman, Sarah (Wyman) 1842-1904. 92 letters; [1884]-[1903] & [n.d.] Jewett, Sarah Orne, 1849-1909. Sarah Orne Jewett additional correspondence, 1868-1930. MS Am 1743.1 -107. Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Transcription from Letters of Sarah Wyman Whitman (1907).
Part of this letter appears on p. 96.
Bar Harbour is Washington out-of-doors, so far as its being really a little cosmopolis, with traces of all climes and conditions in a fine mêlée, and social impulse fusing the material. Well, for two or three days, it is not bad, and I am glad to get for a moment off rails which have more persistent grip in them than usual even.
Louise Imogen Guiney to Annie Adams Fields
Dear Mrs. Fields:
My petition to the good pirate in Portland seems to have struck home: and here's his note. In thanking him for the promised October bibelot of the two great Arnold elegies,* I made bold to beg one thing more: the whole, or some part, of Sir Thomas Browne's dear Hydriotaphia.* 'Tis a gentle Mosher, and I hope. A bonnie joke, is it not? for him to hoodwink the little Publick into taking pure literature in pill form. One envies him.
The trains were all on their best behavior, and I arrived at 7:45. (That night I lay awake again, but last night I can give no account of, for the right thing swallowed me up.) Just as I came upon the platform, I chanced to see Mr. and Mrs. Aldrich* across the station, and I was much concerned that the latter carried a stick. I trust she is better.
The Chianti bottles are hung, and hold poppies, the best straight-stemmed flowers, except geraniums, which our present garden affords. The mother of me sends her affectionate thanks with mine for all your goodness to me, at Manchester, and in other nameable places! Please tell Miss Jewett* that I love her, and ^do^ persistently offer my hand and heart.
You see this is a cunning two-paged letter: for it need never be answered.
L. I. G.
Aug. 13, '97
Auburndale, Masstts.
Notes
good pirate in Portland: In 1897, the American private press publisher in Portland, Maine, Thomas Bird Mosher (1852-1923), released a volume containing British poet, Matthew Arnold's (1822-1888), The Scholar Gypsy (1853) and Thyrsis (1866).
Sir Thomas Browne's ... Hydriotaphia: British author, Sir Thomas Browne (1605-1682) wrote on many subjects. Hydriotaphia, Urn Burial, or, a Discourse of the Sepulchral Urns lately found in Norfolk (1658) describes the antiquities of the title, then surveys burial and funeral customs through history.
Mosher eventually published The Last Chapter of Hydriotaphia in 1913.
Aldrich: Thomas Bailey and Lilian Woodman Aldrich. See Key to Correspondents.
Miss Jewett: Sarah Orne Jewett. See Key to Correspondents.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Huntington Library, San Marino, CA, in the James T. Fields collection Box 26: mss FI 1612. Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Alice French to Sarah Orne Jewett
around the initials A and F superimposed, and leaf-like images ]
My dear Miss Jewett: --
I can't be in your country without wanting to see you.
Are you anywhere near? My friend Mrs. Blain* is going to drive me over to pay a visit to the Fields and I shall ask her the right address, but I can't seem to wait: so trust this to your publishers
Alice French
1897: This date has been assigned by Colby College archivists. I am not able to read the final digit of the number on my photographed copy, but I trust that the archivists could see it on the physical ms.
Mrs. Bain: This person has not yet been identified.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Miller Library, Special Collections, Colby College, Waterville, ME: JEWE.1. Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Miriam Foster Choate Pratt to Sarah Orne Jewett
Thursday --
You are the dearest of dears to come & take my hand & [ tell ? ] me you were sorry -- it makes me quite warm to have another head. Thank you{.} ^It was^ not a 'harmless [ she ? ]' -- I did feel a little choky in my throat & there were lumps there, when Helen & Alice* set off to [ unrecognized word ] to see you & dear A.F.* & the folkses; & [ music ? ] too -- because you see I can have a head ache any day down here, but I cannot have [ unrecognized word ] you beloved ones --
While they was a making up my little bed, I was wrapped & put by the window, & I will tell you what I saw -- The loveliest [ silhouette ? ] against the green that I did ever see -- & it was fair & tall & [ peaceful ? ], & I sent a blessing after it! --
Dear A.F. did she come down weary & worn in well doing? -- It seems [ that ? ] I never heard of such poor times, & I not in 'em! Who is there now with you to play the tabor & the harp? -- To please my [ lady ? ]{.}
Twin* & I have not had the Palgrave's Landscape,* & to have it from you would be too lovely -- I am so glad [ my ? ]
[ Page 4 ]
Alice* saw you all -- dear Alice & Nelly! -- Sometimes the strength to endure seems warming -- I shall give your message to E.E.P when he comes from town, where he has gone to talk statue with Mr French* -- This soft lake air has been everything to him, so it matters little that it seems to have no message for [ Twinnies ? ]! --
I kiss both you and dear Annie --
Notes
1897: This date appears to have been penciled in, but 19 August did fall on a Thursday in 1897.
Helen & Alice: Almost certainly, Pratt's sister, Helen Choate Bell, and Alice Mary Longfellow. Key to correspondents.
A.F.: Annie Adams Fields. Key to Correspondents.
Twin: Among their friends, Pratt and her sister, Helen Choate Bell, often were called the twins. Key to Correspondents.
Palgrave's Landscape: Landscape in Poetry from Homer to Tennyson (1897) by British critic, poet and anthologist Francis Turner Palgrave (1824-1897).
eyes: Pratt quotes from "In Memoriam LXVI," by British poet Alfred Lord Tennyson (1809-1892).
my Alice ... Nelly: Pratt's Alice was her younger daughter, Alice Ellerton Pratt Burr (1866-1945).
Alice's daughter was Mary Hartwell Burr Russell (1898-1977). Probably, then, Nelly is Pratt's niece, Helen Choate Prince. Key to Correspondents and Find a Grave.
E.E.P. ... Mr French: Pratt's husband, Edward Ellerton Pratt.
American sculptor Daniel Chester French (1850-1931). His "Rufus Choate Memorial" was completed in 1898.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University, Cambridge, MA. Sarah Orne Jewett Correspondence, bMS Am 1743 Box 4, Item 183. I. Letters to Sarah Orne Jewett.
Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Louise Imogen Guiney to Annie Adams Fields
Monstrous, (dear, dear friend!) that I should 'misunderstand', or resent, or neglect any word of yours. No indeed: it was merely that my time has been completely taken up, of late, with all sorts of things, chiefly domestic. (!) I try to believe your good praises of my small Works, and I believe the very gentle strictures without trying at all, and shall
The main trouble with my prose is, and has ever been, that it had a too archaic nursing. I was cooled in the mould of the seventeenth-century men, before I had any inkling at all that there was a nineteenth-century mould, too! And ever since, you see I have been set on being a leetle more 'like folks': and may hap I shall succeed, if I stick to the ink-bottle. I have to fight with terrible whimseys, and I lack purpose, and especially ambition. The poor old residue, [ of blotted ] what does get uttered, however, is the honestest-Injun thing a-going. Effective or ineffective, it never bids for effect. I didn't see the review which took me to task for 'Henry-the-Eighth', etc. Perhaps the critic is one of those who doesn't know when an authorling is in fun: in which case I commit him to Hermes.* to be made over.
My farmeress and her farm do as well as may be, and General Sleeplessness and myself continue to battle, with great gusto. I hope William finds mushrooms at breakfast-time for his donne beate.*
With every affectionate remembrance to Miss Jewett,
Louis I. Guiney.
Notes
1897: This date is uncertain. Guiney's lengthy response to a negative review of her work may refer to Edward Everett Hale, Jr. See notes below.
Caesar: Almost certainly, Guiney refers to Julius Caesar (100-44 BC), the first Roman emperor, but Guiney seems more specifically to reference British playwright William Shakespeare's presentation of "proud Caesar" in his 1599 play, The Tragedy of Julius Caesar.
'Henry-the-Eighth': It is likely that Fields has reported to Guiney on a review of her book, Patrins (1897). Patrins is a collection of short essays, which reviewers generally characterized as amusing and interesting. In one piece, "Some Impressions from the Tudor Exhibition," Guiney discusses at length a Hans Holbein portrait of Britain's King Henry the Eighth.
The review Fields refers to seems not to be among those available through ProQuest. The one negative review currently in that selection (accessed June 2021) is "Nothing But Leaves," by Edward Everett Hale, Jr. in The Dial 23 (16 September, 1897) p. 145, which may not have appeared by the date of this letter, if the letter is from 1897. He offers commentary on Guiney's style that may indicate what other detractors may have said:
We have spoken of Miss Guiney's style, and it is best to be more particular on the subject. Miss Guiney's style is a combination of meticulated Emersonionism and effeminate imitation of Stevenson. It take for fundamental principle the theory that an essay is a string of aphorisms, a sequence of declarative sentences, without formal connection. This crude and unrhythmical kind of prose is adorned with an enormous accumulation of figures of speech and painfully selected adverbs and adjectives. To what is original is added a equal amount of quotation. The whole is stuck over with such expressions as "marry" and "methinks" and all syntactical affections adopted by those who have rediscovered the Elizabethans. Such a style we have in hesitation in pronouncing bad, no matter how clever.Hermes: An ancient Greek Olympian god, herald of the gods, sometimes regarded as a trickster.
farmeress: Guiney's mother.
William ... donne beate: Latin donne beate: blessed women. Guiney may allude to Canto II of Inferno by the Italian poet, Dante (c. 1265-1321).
Fields seems to have had an employee named William. He is first mentioned in known correspondence of 1899.
Miss Jewett: Sarah Orne Jewett. See Key to Correspondents.
Henri-Raymond Casgrain to Sarah Orne Jewett
This letter was composed in French; a transcription follows the translation.
Editor's note*
Madame,
I have not yet had the pleasure of receiving M. and Mme. Crafts,* but I look forward to seeing them. I hope they will come later.
My friend, Father [ Audet ? ],* will write you himself with the information you asked for
about the Madonna,* which, he says, is not by Moroni, but by Maratti, whom the French call Maratta.
I have not heard from Mme. Blanc-Bentzon* since her return to Paris. Perhaps I will see her soon; for I believe I will be obliged to hasten my departure for France.
Please remember me to your sister and to Master Theodore, and believe me
HR Casgrain
Notes
Editor's note: This document was added to the Sarah Orne Jewett Text Project or revised after June 2022. At that time it became necessary to change format, mainly to eliminate nearly all links to other documents. As a result, this letter differs in format from most others in the collection.
letterhead: A printed design at center top, in black ink, consisting of the stylized, superimposed initials C H R.
An envelope associated with this letter is addressed to Jewett in South Berwick. Though the Quebec cancellation is barely readable, there is a South Berwick cancellation on the back on 28 August 1897. Stamped on the back flap of the envelope is the letterhead design in what appears to be brown ink.
Crafts: It is likely that Casgrain refers to Clemence Haggerty (1841-1912) and James Mason Crafts (1839-1917), an American chemist, who taught at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Jewett and Fields mention them in other letters from around 1900.
Father Audet: The transcription is uncertain, and this person has not yet been identified. A contemporary priest was Abbé Andre Audet (1837-1904). His obituary in the Quebec Chronicle of 11 October 1904, p. 6, identifies him as "cure of L'Anse aux Gascons," a village in New Brunswick, about 700 km from Quebec City.
Madonna: Italian artist, Carlo Maratta or Maratti (1625-1713) made or had attributed to him a number of representations of the Virgin Mary. While it seems likely that Jewett has asked Casgrain about a painting she saw during her recent visit to Quebec City, such a painting has not yet been identified.
Jewett apparently had the impression that the painting she had asked about was by Giovanni Battista Moroni (c. 1520-1579). Wikipedia.
Blanc-Bentzon: Marie Thérèse de Solms Blanc. See Key to Correspondents.
Blanc visited in the United States in 1897, and traveled to Quebec with Jewett, her sister, Mary Rice Jewett, and their recently orphaned nephew, Theodore Jewett Eastman.
This letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University, Cambridge, MA: b MS Am 1743, Sarah Orne Jewett Correspondence I, Casgrain, Henry Raymond, 1831-1904. 4 letters; 1897-1901. Identifier: (38). Transcription, translation and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College, with essential assistance from Jeannine Hammond, Professor of French, Emerita, at Coe College.
Transcription
Je n'ai pas eu la plaisir jusqu'à
présent de recevoir la visite de M.
et Mme Crafts que j'aurais été heureux
d'entretenir. J'espére qu'ils viendront
plus tard.
Mon ami, M. l'Abbé [ Audet ? ], va vous
écrire et vous répondre lui-même aux
informations que vous demandez au
sujet de la Madone qui, dit-il, n'est pas
de Moroni, mais de Maratti, appelé par
les Français Maratta.
Je n'ai pas reçu de nouvelles de
Mme Blanc-Bentzon depuis son retour
à Paris. Il pourrait se faire que ^je^ la
visse bientôt; car je crois que je serai
obligé de hâter mon départ pour la France.
Veuillez me rappeler au bon souvenir
de Mlle votre soeur, de M. Théodore, et me croire
HR Casgrain
Eva von Blomberg to Sarah Orne Jewett
Aug 23. 1897
My dear Sarah,
This very day I had settled to write to you so that you might have a visible greeting from me at the beginning of a new year* of your life and this forenoon a fat letter from my brother contains, beside one from my [ mother ? ] and [ Trine ? ] and [ unreadable word ] that previous one from you for which I thank you with all my heart! My thoughts are so very often with you -- [ there ?] at dear South Berwick and often at the dear cottage in Manchester.* I live over in my heart so many dear times in both those places. "We cannot lose those whom we love in [ two unreadable words ] we cannot lose" says St. Augustine* and I realize that is a great comfort while I go about [ the ? ] so many places where I miss dear people and have to say good-bye again and while I think of those who seem far away both in this world and the
higher one and perhaps one nearer in spirit than we think. Dear Sarah, it will be good to see you again. I am looking forward eagerly to getting [ back ? ] to the hub* and my dear mother and sister and beloved friends and my work. You see by the above address that I am staying with the Lanfords,* [ unrecognized name ] and Livy only were at home when I arrived last Wednesday and today we are expecting their father and mother. The former is going away again on a three weeks tour to the Shetland Islands and I have to leave the day after to spend a week with a friend at Windsor{.} [ From Manchester ? ] going to Richmond, Yorkshire. It will be very sad to be there without my dear old friend Charlotte* who is still under a physicians care and not even allowed to write or be written to. There is hope that she may [ quite? ] recover { -- } it needs patience{.} I had [ such ? ] an interesting time in June attending some of the lectures of
the vacation-course for teachers and meeting very nice [ collegues so spelled ] from all parts of the globe almost. My [ ex-guardian ? ] and [ uncle ? ]-in-law took me on many splendid tramps for he is an excellent walker [ 1 or 2 unreadable words ] of his [ unreadable word ] and a great lover of nature. His sister, who is 81, was quite delightful too and has just written me a letter as if we were both young girls who had a good time together and were missing each other. The country around Jena is beautiful and the old [ towns ? ] very quaint and picturesque and full of memories of great and helpful [ men ? ] My first school-friend and her 15 year old daughter came there from Berlin to see me and we had such a good time. The girl was so eager about everything and we all felt very young together and had a great deal of fun. I do not have any sad memories connected with Jena as I have with Weimar, but I love to be there ^in W.^ all the same,
and spent another day there [ on my ? ] way to Cassel and London. I had a beautiful day at the Wartburg the present commander being my cousin, Hans Lucas von Cranach,* who showed me most beautiful and interesting things that one does not see usually! [ Mrs ? ] and Miss Wesselhoeft* of Boston were at Weimar and it was a great pleasure [ 1 or 2 unrecognized words ] about that dear places [ unreadable letters & perhaps an insertion ] with them. Aug. 24. Mr and Mrs. H* arrived in good condition yesterday and Mr H. has just gone off again on his coasting trip. They both and Helen send their warmest regards and love to all friends who will accept them. I am reading [ unrecognized name, looks like Nausere ] here. Among other things I read last summer was on Child-Study by Prof. Tully,* full of the most suggestive observations. I want to read The Choir Invisible by James Lane Allen,* have you read it? You like the Kentucky Cardinal so much. I must get off some more letters today and therefore say [ good ? ] bye to you. [ 3 unreadable words ]! I was so glad to hear about Theodore* and your journey to [ unreadable name ] etc. I wish I could see Mme Blanc,* but I do not go to Paris. I hope to hear good news about [ unrecognized word ] O'Brion's* [ niece ? ] from my mother [ perhaps 2 unreadable words ]. Love to all dear people you can give it to, most of all your dear self and dear Mrs Fields from
your loving and faithful friend
Notes
year: Jewett's birthday was 3 September.
Trine: This transcription is uncertain. Little information has been discovered about the von Blomberg family.
Manchester: Summer home of Annie Adams Fields. See Key to Correspondents.
Augustine: Roman theologian, Augustine of Hippo (354-430). Though St. Augustine is known to have believed that people would be reunited with their deceased loved ones after death, the location of this precise quotation is as yet unknown.
hub: This seems clearly to be what von Blomberg wrote. Presumably she refers to Boston, her current home.
Lanfords: This transcription is uncertain; it could easily read Sanfords. This family has not yet been identified.
Charlotte: This person has not yet been identified.
Cranach: The Wartburg is a medieval castle near Eisenach, Germany. Hans Lucas von Cranach (d. 1929) became Castle Captain of the Wartburg in 1895. He was a descendant of the German painters Lucas Cranach the Elder and the Younger.
Wesselhoeft: The Wesselhoeft family was prominent in Boston. Which members von Blomberg refers to here is not yet known.
Mr and Mrs. H: These people have not yet been identified. Helen, it appears, traveled with them.
Tully: This person and his work have not yet been identified.
Allen: American author James Lane Allen (1849-1925) published The Kentucky Cardinal (1894) and The Choir Invisible (1897). Wikipedia.
Theodore: Theodore Jewett Eastman. See Key to Correspondents.
Mme Blanc: Marie Thérèse de Solms Blanc. See Key to Correspondents.
O'Brion's: Probably, this is Mary Eliza O'Brion (1859-1930 -- unconfirmed life dates), Boston-based concert pianist, private teacher, and instructor at Wellesley College. Her name appears regularly on programs as a piano soloist and accompanist with various groups and orchestras.
The identity of her niece is not yet known.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University: Sarah Orne Jewett Correspondence Series: I. Letters to Sarah Orne Jewett MS Am 1743, (60) Eva 1 letter; 1897.
This transcription is from a photocopy held by the Maine Women Writer's Collection, University of New England, Letters from Sarah Orne Jewett, 1875-1890, Box 4, Folder 159, Burton Trafton Jewett Research Collection.
Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Helen Brooke Herford to Sarah Orne Jewett
Aug 24 97.
Dear Sarah
Eva* is once more here for the [ stubby ? ] scrap of a week she doles out to me once in two years! History repeats itself as she brings in her letter to you and asks me if I would like to add to hers.
It is pretty much like
pushing my letter down an old pump sending it to you for that is the last I hear [ there y ? ] but I am always delighted to [ unrecognized word ] into you tho' they are only on one side.
Eva is a dear -- as ever { -- } and the next two years look as if they would be
dreadfully long & dull before I see her face again.
She has been sitting with me each day at our work gossiping about you & Mrs Fields* & all the other dear people we see & hear of so seldom, and she will come back to you later with much love from us to you.
She says you are going to have a birthday* shortly so
let me wish you many happy returns of the day and Believe me
Notes
Eva: Baroness Eva von Blomberg. See Key to Correspondents.
Mrs Fields: Annie Adams Fields. See Key to Correspondents.
birthday: Jewett's birthday was 3 September.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University: Sarah Orne Jewett Correspondence I, Letters to Sarah Orne Jewett.
Herford, Helen Brooke 1 letter; 1897. (93).
This transcription is from a photocopy held by the Maine Women Writer's Collection, University of New England, Letters from Sarah Orne Jewett, 1875-1890, Box 2, Folder 99, Burton Trafton Jewett Research Collection.
Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Wyman Whitman to Sarah Orne Jewett
[ 28 August 1897 ]*
I went down Yesterday and spent the night at Saunderstown,* where Jack & the Children are, my darling: and where also is Flos La Farge with her little Twins, and Mr. Lockwood.* And where, farther is the the Rhode Island landscape: always one step nearer Heaven than any other landscape for me. The conditions were small at this little town
[ Page 2 ]
I have them [ unrecognized word ] loved them all. I had much talk with Jack about politics
[ Page 3 ]
and the critique of Nelson. A splendid order! and
we had some [ agreements or arguments ] as to the
construction of a piece of work which would leave Nelson in his
due blaze of glory: and then have room to say one word
concerning something greater than Glory. But I am sure Mahan,*
like many another
[ Page 4 ]
sunny moralist, has forgotten that one cannot consider a romantic hero like Nelson, apart from his star: has failed to recognize that this fiery genius, sincere, passionate, simple -- and amazingly child-like, loved as he fought: and the proportions make his love forever heroic. -----
I am now search
[ Page 5 ]
ing for a perfect nursery governess for the children -- Jack had thought of a German (for the sake of languages &c) but I think, and he would agree, that an intelligent & devoted woman is the first necessity. Whoever comes must have entire authority with the children: & this is more likely to be satisfactorily vested in an American. Do have it in your mind dear friend. ---- Your[ Page 6 ]
I shall be on deck at Old Place at 3 o clk: if all's well today, & this will go speeding
[ Page 7 ]
to So. Berwick with a message of true love.
Thine
Notes
1897: The envelope associated with this letter is addressed to Jewett at South Berwick, cancelled on 28 August 1897. Whitman has superimposed the capital "S"over the "A" in August. As that date fell on a Saturday in 1897, perhaps she meant to indicate the weekday.
Saunderstown: On the west side of Narragansett Bay in Rhode Island.
Jack ... Flos La Farge with her little Twins ... Mr. Lockwood:
Florence Lockwood (1864 - 1944) married American architect, Christopher Grant LaFarge (1862-1938) of Heins & LaFarge.
Her parents were Benoni Lockwood (1834-1909) and Florence Bayard Lockwood (1842-1898). The identities of their twin children have not yet been discovered, but it seems likely they were the daughters, Florence Bayard and Margaret Grant, the latter as Margaret Grant LaFarge Osborn, the author of The Ring and the Dream (1947).
Jack is the American author, John Jay Chapman (1862-1933). Trained at Harvard Law School, he practiced law in New York City while achieving distinction as an essayist. He was for a few years editor of the journal, The Political Nursery (1897-1901). Whitman came to know him when he married her protégée, Minna Elisa Timmins (1861 - 25 January 1897) in 1889. Timmins was the adopted child of Martin Brimmer (1829 - 1926), first director of the Boston Museum of Fine Arts. Chapman and Timmins had three children.
In August of 1897, Chapman was a grieving widower in search of help with his children. In a letter of July 14, 1897, Whitman worries about Jack's apparently temporary disappearance.
Jamestown ... Newport: Newport is on the east side of Narragansett Bay in Rhode Island; Jamestown is on Conanicut Island, between Newport and Saunderstown.
critique of Nelson ... Mahan: Alfred Thayer Mahan (1840-1914), American naval officer and historian, is the author of The Life of Nelson (1897). Research: Gabe Heller.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University. Whitman, Sarah (Wyman) 1842-1904. 92 letters; [1884]-[1903] & [n.d.] Jewett, Sarah Orne, 1849-1909. Sarah Orne Jewett additional correspondence, 1868-1930. MS Am 1743.1 -107. Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.Transcription from Letters of Sarah Wyman Whitman (1907).
Part of this letter appears on pp. 96-7.
I went down yesterday and spent the night at Saunderstown . . . the Rhode Island landscape; always one step nearer Heaven than any other landscape for me. The conditions were small at this little town, which is no town at all, but only a few houses dropped by accident in the fields, and an old pier straggling idly out to meet some tiny boats which puff in from Jamestown to Newport every now and then, only this, but divine! . . . Much talk with Jack about politics and the critique of Nelson. A splendid order and we had some arguments as to the construction of a piece of work which would leave Nelson in his due blaze of glory, and then have room to say one word concerning something greater than Glory. But I am sure Mahan has forgotten that one cannot consider a romantic hero like Nelson apart from his star, has failed to recognize that this fiery genius, sincere, passionate, simple and amazingly child-like, loved as he fought, and the proportions make his love forever heroic. . . . Your letter was a great comfort, coming on a dull day. I am all right; and never, you know, can lead an easy life. For which we must always give thanks.
William James to Sarah Orne Jewett
Having just read your Country of the pointed firs,* I can't hold in from telling you what exquisite pleasure it has given me. It has that
leaves town. The proper reaction upon it is the uncontrollable expression of pleasure in ones face and not a pretense of analytic words from ones pen -- and the expression is in my face whenever I think of it.
Wm James
My wife is just the same.
Notes
firs: The Country of the Pointed Firs (1896).
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University: Sarah Orne Jewett Correspondence I, Letters to Sarah Orne Jewett.
James, William, 1842-1910. 3 letters; 1890-1902. (112).
This transcription is from a photocopy held by the Maine Women Writer's Collection, University of New England, Letters from Sarah Orne Jewett, 1875-1890, Box 2, Folder 99, Burton Trafton Jewett Research Collection.
Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Mary Rice Jewett to Sarah Orne Jewett
[ Summer 1897 ]*
There is no going abroad for joys this afternoon for everything is soaked with the heavy shower that came while we were at dinner. Something sent me to the camphor room* which was a mercy for such a lively leak as had started there somewhere round the window but the bath tub was just large enough to cover the dripping place, so no damage
was done, but we must have the place seen to at once. I dare say a shingle has cracked somewhere. The rain came in such good time for it was getting dusty again strange as it may seem. Thider* and I had a very beautiful morning with our books, and he wrote some letters also I believe. I send you Will's* letter to which I answered that we should be very glad to see him, for if the Merrimans* do come we can stow him somewhere and it will do him good
to see them. The letter sounds tired doesn't it? What a cheerful screed from Frances* who seems to have had such a good time. Let us take Farny* some day over that road will you? They went across from Dover Point to Greenland, at least that was the way they meant to go, and it could not have been much further for they did not leave here until after nine and got home before [ one corrected ] she says. We went for a little ride yesterday the Indigo Hill
road and home through Guptills Woods and Sligo. The sun was pretty warm in the morning and indeed not very cool when we went out.
Lizzie Walker* came calling and I believe that was all except Mrs. Gordon* for the papers{.} I forgot that I wrote you last night so that you will probably get both letters at once, but you will have to make the best of such [ a affliction so it appears ].
Thiddy's shirts came all right, and when I asked if he had any message he mentioned that he was going to write you! It was a great visit, and its events have
been named with great pomp! Love to you both. MRJ.
Timmy* would be ashamed not to be glad to see his family! He isn't like another of his kind who isn't!
Notes
Summer 1897: This letter almost certainly was composed after the death of Theodore Eastman's mother, Jewett's sister Caroline Eastman, on 1 April 1897 and about the time he began undergraduate work at Harvard in the fall of 1897. It is possible that this letter dates from any of the years Theodore Eastman summered with his aunts in South Berwick while he was an undergraduate.
camphor room: Camphor was used medicinally to relieve cold symptoms.
Thider: Theodore Jewett Eastman. Later spelled Thidder. See Key to Correspondents.
Will's: Jewett had many acquaintances and relatives named William, but which she would have called "Will" is not yet known.
Merrimans: The family of Helen Merriman. See Key to Correspondents.
Frances: Possibly Frances Fisk Perry Dudley. See Lucretia Morse Fisk Perry in Key to Correspondents.
Farny: As the Frances who has just visited Jewett in South Berwick has already traveled this road, Farny would seem to be another Frances, but it is not yet known which one from among the Jewett acquaintances. This name does not appear in other letters.
Lizzie Walker: Possibly a South Berwick neighbor, Mary Elizabeth Hobbs Walker (1848-1934).
Mrs. Gordon: This may be Grace Gordon Treadwell Walden's mother. See Walden in Key to Correspondents.
Timmy: A Jewett family dog.
The manuscript of the letter is held by the University of New England Maine Women Writers Collection, MWWC0196_02_00_012_01. Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Sara Norton
South Berwick, 3 September [1897 or after].*
It is so nice to direct your envelope to Ashfield,* that I must speak of it to begin with! Your last letter from London came yesterday and made me sorrier than ever, because I could not carry out my best of plans of going to town: I do so wish to see you! I wish that Berwick were on the way to Ashfield; but then one might as well wish for things that can come true.
This is my birthday and I am always nine years old -- not like George Sand, who begins a letter no, no! I mean Madame de Sévigne!! -- "5 fevrier 16 -- ; il y a aujourd' hui mille ans que je suis née!"* If you were here I should just stop a long bit of copying and take a short bit of luncheon in a little plain basket, and you and I would go off at once up "the little river" to keep this birthday with suitable exercises. I have quite forsaken the tide river for its smaller sister this year, the banks are so green and all the trees lean over it heavy with leaves. You have come home at the end of the most beautiful summer that I have ever seen; it is still like June here and impossible to believe that we are only two or three weeks from frost. I shall love to think of you in Ashfield.
And the partings, dear Sally! oh, yes, I feel deep in my heart all that you say in your letter. One feels how easy it is for friends to slip away out of this world and leave us lonely. And such good days as you have had are too good to be looked for often. There is something transfiguring in the best of friendship. One remembers the story of the transfiguration in the New Testament,* and sees over and over in life what the great shining hours can do, and how one goes down from the mountain where they are, into the fret of everyday life again, but strong in remembrance. I once heard Mr. Brooks* preach a great sermon about this: nobody could stay on the mount, but every one knew it, and went his way with courage by reason of such moments. You cannot think what a sermon it was!
I have just been reading the life of
the Master of Balliol,* and finding great pleasure within. You
knew, didn't you? how fond he and Mrs. Dugdale were of each
other, and that he was the kindest of friends to her sons. There
is little of this in the two big volumes, I suppose because she
is not given to letter-writing, which the Master certainly was,
-- some of his letters belong almost to the level of our E. F.
G., -- or I must say quite, when I remember some to Dean
Stanley* and to the Tennysons. But this is too long a letter for
the busiest of hard-working mornings.
Notes
1897 or after: The earliest date for this letter would seem to be 1897, based on the publication of The Life and Letters of Benjamin Jowett (1897). However, it could have been composed in a later year.
Ashfield: Charles Eliot Norton (1827-1908) was
co-editor of the North American Review (1863-1868) and
then professor of literature at Harvard University. He and his
daughters' summer home was in Ashfield.
Madame de Sévigné!! -- "5 fevrier 16 - ; il y a aujourd' hui
mille ans que je suis née!": Marie de Rabutin-Chantal,
marquise de Sévigné (1626-1696). Her correspondence with her
daughter, more than 1500 letters, was published between 1725 and
1734. The sentence reads, "I was born a thousand years ago
today." (Translation by Carla Zecher). Jewett could have read
the letters in French or in an English translation such as Sarah
Buell Hale's The Letters of Madame De Sévigné to Her
Daughter and Friends (1855).
forsaken the tide river for its smaller sister: The
tidal estuary of South Berwick is the Piscataqua River, a stream
of about twelve miles between South Berwick, ME and Portsmouth,
NH. It is likely that Jewett has been spending time on the
Salmon Falls River, one of several rivers that flow into the
Piscataqua. The Salmon Falls River forms part of the
border between Maine and New Hampshire, northwestward from South
Berwick.
the transfiguration in the New Testament: See Matthew 17:2 and Mark 9:2.
Mr. Brooks: Phillips Brooks (1835-1893). See
Jewett's "At
the
Funeral
of
Phillips Brooks."
the Master of Balliol: Benjamin Jowett (1817-1893), popular professor of Greek at Oxford, author and translator. Jewett is reading The Life and Letters of Benjamin Jowett (1897).
E. F. G. ... Dean Stanley: E. F. G. has not be identified with certainty, but very likely this is Edward FitzGerald, who often signed his letters E. F. G. And his friends sometimes referred to him by his initials in their letters .(Letters and Literary Remains of Edward Fitzgerald, 1889). Jewett mentions him at least twice to Sara Norton in in letters 99 and 111. Confirmation or correction would be welcome.Arthur Penrhyn Stanley (1815-1881), who eventually became Dean of Westminster, was a colleague and friend of Jowett at Oxford, where he was professor of Ecclesiastical History.
Mrs. W. S. Dugdale. Her husband, who died heroically in an 1882 mining accident, was a beloved pupil of Benjamin Jowett at Oxford. In The Life and Letters of Benjamin Jowett (1897), appears her account of her husband's love and respect for his teacher and Jowett's letter to her upon Dugdale's death.
This letter appears in Annie Fields, Letters of Sarah Orne Jewett (1911), Transcribed by Annie Adams Fields, with notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Marie Thérèse de Solms Blanc to Annie Adams Fields
This postcard was composed in French; a transcription follows the translation.
Dear Annie, I received from a merchant in Boston a letter which gives me, I confess, little hope for the sale of the carpets in which I have an interest; he speaks of good buys and wants to say that handpicked rugs can be recommended only by this quality that a [ unrecognized words ] can understand. Only in Russia do they know how to appreciate a flawless Oriental rug; that's why they bring* such prices at the Nizhny Novgorod fair* when they are, like the blue one, interesting -- considered among those of the greatest beauty. The others sell quickly in Paris, where people don't know much about rugs and are seduced merely by color and design. I did, however, send this gentleman the list he was asking for, and I thank you for taking care of it, but I really don't expect anything to come of it.The McClures* just spent a few days here and left very happy with La Ferté, taking along a book of yours. They will see that you get it.
Did you receive the Sabatier* (registered)?
Vernon Lee* has kept me company for a couple days.
The conversation is authoritative. We speak much of you.
I embrace you with my heart
Is Norah* married? . .
Notes
bring: Blanc seems clearly to have written " alterguent" here, but we are unable to work out exactly what she means. The context suggests "bring" as a translation, but we are uncertain.
Nizhny Novgorod fair: The Nizhny Novgorod Fair in 19th-century Russia was a large annual international market and exhibition, drawing many foreign merchants from Central Asia, Iran, and Inda.
McClures: Mr. and Mrs. Samuel Sidney McClure. See Key to Correspondents.
Sabatier: While this is not certain, it is likely that Blanc refers to the French clergyman and historian, Paul Sabatier (1858-1928), remembered for his Life of St. Francis of Assisi (1894).
Vernon Lee: Violet Paget. See Key to Correspondents.
Norah: This person has not yet been identified.
The manuscript of this card is held by the Huntington Library, San Marino, CA, in the James T. Fields Papers and Addenda mss FI 1-5637, Box 5. Transcription, translation and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College, with essential assistance from Jeannine Hammond, Professor of French, Emerita, at Coe College.
Transcription
This note was sent on a French postcard cancelled in La Ferté sous Jouarre on 3 September 1897. It is addressed to Fields at Manchester by the Sea. Blanc sometimes abbreviates "vous" to "vs." Here these are rendered as "vous."
Chère Annie, J'ai reçu d'un marchand de Boston une lettre
qui me donne je l'avoue peu l'espoir [ pr for pour ] la vente des tapis
auxquels je m'intéresse; car il parle de bon marché et il
va vous dire que les tapis triés sur le volet ne peuvent
se recommander par cette qualité cette qu'un [ unrecognized words ] la
comprendre. Ce n'est guère qu'en Russie que l'on sait
apprécier un tapis d'Orient sans défaut; voilà pourquoi
ils [ alterguent ? ] de tels prix à la foire de [ Nigni for Nizhny ? ] Novgorod quand
ils sont, comme le blu intéressants de ceux-ci de
toute première beauté. Les autres s'enlèvent rapidement
à Paris oû l'on est médiocrement connaissant, séduit
seulement par la couleur et le dessin. J'ai fait cependant
envoyer à ce monsieur la liste qu'il demandait, et
je vous remercie de vous en être occupée, mais en réalité je n'attends
rien de ce côt
Sarah Orne Jewett to Harriet Elizabeth Prescott Spofford
Septr 5th
[ 1897 ]*
My dear Hally
I have been thanking you many times for the "Master Spirit"* without writing to say so, but please forgive such an unwilling pen! Indeed I thank you for both the books; we have both* enjoyed The Inheritance very much.. I
believe that I must say that it seems to me the best piece of work, of its sort, that you have ever done, very strong, but full of all your poetic feeling, for I must always put your poetry first, and love the prose chiefly because one finds it there too.
= We still say to each other how much we enjoyed
Notes
1897: "1905" has been added in pencil below the September date, almost certainly in another hand. The rationale for this entry is not known. The letter suggests that Jewett writes soon, though not as soon as she feels she should have, after receiving copies of Spofford's two recent novels. As the second appeared by the spring of 1897, it is highly likely that Jewett wrote to Spofford later that year.
This note has a black letterhead stamp in the upper left, consisting of the partially overlapped initials, "SOJ" inside a circle.
"Master Spirit": Spofford's novel, A Master Spirit (1896).
A mark like an apostrophe appears over the "r" in master; though it appears deliberate, its meaning is not known.
both: Jewett refers to Annie Adams Fields. See Key to Correspondents.
The Inheritance: Spofford's novel, An Inheritance (1897). Reviews indicate that this title was available by spring 1897.
Jewett has emphasized "much" by placing 7 dots beneath the word. She also placed two periods after the word. She may have placed a single dot below "very" as well.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the McCormick Library of Northwestern University: Sarah Orne Jewett Letter, Northwestern University Library Special Collections Department./ Manuscript cardfile in Special Collections Department.
Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sara Norton to Sarah Orne Jewett (fragment)
Your dear letter was waiting here to greet me on Monday when I arrived; & Lily had given me your messages. But return home means full days just at first -- Many people to see, & necessary notes to write -- and an immediate plunge into household affairs once more -- without the immediate knowledge of the detail of the last 3 months, to make
it quite plain sailing. But here I sit on a very quiet morning with all my thoughts turned to S. Berwick & you -- & the pleasant sense of how delightful it will be when I see you again. When I got here, & found Aunt Theo* was going to you the very day after my arrival -- & then I began to wish she were starting at once, so that
I could hear the sooner about you! I have no doubt Aunt Theo will have told you all there was to tell about [ me written over something ] & my adventures, and Mrs. Burnett,* & the voyage -- and my trunk that came soaked with water out of the hold! &c &c. All in fact that you may have wanted to hear -- So I will not go back to all that. Margie whom I found, not
well, poor dear, when I got here is now much better, and Papa seems delightfully well I'm glad to say. Lily alas! is still in exile, kept by the sea, by that fearfully tormenting enemy of hers -- but we had two days & a half in Cambridge together which was much better than nothing. You cannot think how green & charming Ashfield looks, even
after greener England -- but oh! how the unfinished look -- (less in the country than in towns) over everything here impresses one. Often ones mind has got used to the well ordered & highly finished look of that little island "bound in with the triumphant sea".* But I rejoice in being back here, & seeing my old friends, & hearing
[ Page 4 ]
yankee tones again -- which are much pleasanter than cockney ones to my way of thinking! Only summer is nearly over, & that is sad -- still the sweet peas are a mass of lovely color & fragrance, & autumn only comes in the evenings -- to warn us that we must be prepared when he goes marching with his flaming torch across the hills. /*
There are [ Letter breaks off; no signature ]
Notes
1897: An envelope associated with this letter is addressed to Jewett in South Berwick, ME, and forwarded to Manchester by the Sea, MA. It was cancelled in Ashfield, MA, and in South Berwick on 8 September 1897. The early morning cancellation in Ashfield, indicates that it was composed on 7 September.
Penciled on the front of envelope in another hand: Miss Norton.
The Norton folder 168, containing this letter, lists just 2 letters, but there are three in it, two complete and this fragment. However, it is possible that the photographer made an error, missing a page in the folder.
The other two letters in this folder from Norton to Jewett are dated 17 March 1908 and 8 September 1907.
Aunt Theo: This could be her mother's sister. Her mother was Susan Ridley Sedgwick Norton (1838-1872). Her mother's youngest sister was Maria Theodora Sedgwick (1851-1916). Find a Grave.
Margie: Norton's sister Margaret. Her sister Elizabeth / Lily also is mentioned. See Norton in Key to Correspondents.
Burnett: Probably Mabel Lowell Burnett. Key to Correspondents.
sea: Norton quotes from Richard II, Act 2 Scene 1, by British playwright William Shakespeare (1564-1616). Wikipedia.
hills. /: I have assumed that Norton's slash mark indicates that she wanted to begin a new paragraph.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University, Cambridge, MA. Sarah Orne Jewett Correspondence, bMS Am 1743 Box 4, Item 168. I. Letters to Sarah Orne Jewett.
Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Frederick M. Hopkins
South Berwick, Maine
September 22, [1897]
Dear Mr. Hopkins:
I am sorry that your note has been so
long
and unanswered.
I do not go to town -- Boston --
until very late in the season and I shall be here through the
autumn busy with writing for the magazines. You will have seen a
story in the Anniversary number of the Atlantic Monthly just
published.1
Yours very truly,
S. O. Jewett
I thank you very much for your kindness in sending me the Review of Reviews.2
Notes
1 "Martha's Lady," Atlantic
Monthly, LXXX (October 1897), 523-533; collected in The
Queen's Twin. The article "Forty Years of The Atlantic
Monthly" on pages 571-576 of this issue included the name of
Sarah Orne Jewett as one of "the long list of notable women" who
had written for the magazine during that period.
2 Review of Reviews, XV(June
1897),
694-695.
contained
an account of Brunetière's visit to the United States, with
incidental comments on Madame Blanc which Hopkins knew would be
of interest to Miss Jewett.
This letter is edited and annotated by
Richard Cary in Sarah Orne Jewett Letters; the ms. is
held by Colby College Special Collections, Waterville, Maine.
Sarah Wyman Whitman to Sarah Orne Jewett
Sept. 23.
[ 1897 ]*
The next sheet* fell out of my portfolio last night darling, to my dismay & general displeasure: but it was a dull little leaf, unworthy of that blossom which still seems to me the most amazing thing of this year. It is now lying softly pressed be-
[ Page 2 ]
Your letter coming this morning into some dulness heartened me up wonderfully: & your stories* went too to convince me that things are solid at the core: which I just long to see them all -- & especially that really [ unrecognized word ] one. O isn't it splendid to feel the sap running up, & see the new bud forming itself to its supreme end! These
[ Page 3 ]
things send one to the altar anew. -----
I am doing everything at once
in these days: for [ that or there ] is [ unrecognized
word much ? ] "beginning" at the places where
people have to begin: & the town looms visibly, and
I am obliged to think of some millions of details, while trying
to make large generaliza-
[ Page 4 ]
tions! You know the ^double^ [deleted word, possibly double blotted ] [ unrecognized word ]
Sometimes I have felt this [ summer ? ] as if the very secrets of life lay patent as never before -- and sometimes I am only a child crying in the night. -----
I put in this some letters just
come which made me
weep those strange tears of grateful love, which
never find a voice, but which keep the heart nourished and
refreshed as with the dew of Heaven. ---- Believe I
rejoiced & yet because I had found I might have been too
stringent in my brief message -- or rather too [ brief ?
] in my stringency. But tis [ Boygone meaning Bygone
? ]: & this is well. Mrs. Wister* has been
spending a week with my Aunt, near the
Gloucester, my cousin's mountain fastness -- & I think you
will like to read her message &
story of the children -- And Ellen Hooper* -- the
[ theme ? ] lighted two generations ago at some torch of
the spirit goes not out in that lovely breast.
Ah well, goodbye
And heaven bless you.
_SW_
Notes
1897: This date in another hand is penciled in the upper right corner of page 1. The accompanying envelope, addressed to Jewett in South Berwick, was cancelled on 24 September 1897.
next sheet: This transcription is uncertain. If it is correct, then perhaps Whitman has enclosed something in this letter that is not included with the manuscript. Whitman used 3 stamps for this letter, while her other letters of this year typically use only one 2 cent stamp.
your stories: It would seem that Whitman may have specific Jewett stories in mind. Unless Jewett was showing her manuscripts, Whitman could have read only one new story in late September of 1897, "Martha's Lady," which appeared in Atlantic Monthly (80:523-533), October 1897.
Mrs. Wister: Sarah Butler Wister (1835-1908), daughter of the actress Frances Anne Kemble, both friends of Henry James. Sarah Wister was the mother of American novelist, Owen Wister (1860-1936).
Ellen Hooper: Probably, Whitman refers to Ellen Sturgis Hooper (1872-1974), the grand-daughter of the American Transcendentalist poet, Ellen Sturgis Hooper (1812-1848). The younger Ellen Hooper married John Briggs Potter in 1908. She is remembered in part because of her portrait, painted by American artist, James Abbott McNeill Whistler (1834-1903).
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University. Whitman, Sarah (Wyman) 1842-1904. 92 letters; [1884]-[1903] & [n.d.] Jewett, Sarah Orne, 1849-1909. Sarah Orne Jewett additional correspondence, 1868-1930. MS Am 1743.1 -107. Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Transcription from Letters of Sarah Wyman Whitman (1907).
Part of this letter appears on pp. 98.
September 24, 1897.
O isn't it splendid to feel the sap running up and see the new bud forming itself to its supreme end! These things send one to the altar anew. . . . I put in this some letters just come which made me weep those strange tears of grateful love, which never find a voice, but which keep the heart nourished and refreshed as with the dew of Heaven.Louise Imogen Guiney to Annie Adams Fields
Dear Mrs. Fields:
I meant to have told you at once, when your note came, about the call I did make on Mr. Page,* and how nobody could have been nicer than he was; when lo! I found myself packed and ticketed for this wild Eden by the big Surfy sea, the little mother alongside. We have been nearly a week at the small country inn, 'whence all but shes have fled',* living on most intimate terms with the landlady, the cow, and the family cat. The white cliffs are a bit like South Devon, but the broken coast is much finer. I had the sloop's tiller yesterday, in a spanking breeze, from Boothbay home, over the inside course, (coves, tidal rivers, 'quts'* &c ... and I must add that we are very Elizabethan
indeed, with our isles at the bay's mouth called 'The Cuckolds'!) and in consequence I slept last night as I have not slept for five mortal months, and feel in the mood to continue. Martinsville has not a single charm for me, after this, except mushrooms! Those I cannot find in the woods here; but the succulent and ubiquitous clam atones. We start for home ere long, with a stop-over in Portland with our dear Shaws:* and I feel as desirous to stay the sun as Joshua in Ajalon.*
But to get back to Mr. Page. You see, I haven't an "unpublished poem", nor even a plum! to excuse my hovering in his doorway, nor anything 'in hand' at all; only the most shifting chaotic ideas of what I should like to do, under absent conditions. He is full of kindness and hospitality towards me, and I am thoroughly
ashamed, the while, to be so perfectly, stupidly unresponsive. If one were sure that time would mend all that! But then again, it matters little: only in so far as it bothers some dear Third Persons, and wastes their blessed concern on the unworthy.
Mother has a rich red nose, coming in from the rocks. I hope you have this same divine weather at Manchester. Tell Miss Jewett* I love her well, and think very often of her scenes and people, as one has to do all along the coast. Alla vostra salute!*
Louise Imogen Guiney
Notes
Mr. Page: Probably this is Walter Hines Page. See Key to Correspondents.
fled: Guiney paraphrases from the ballad of a heroic sailor boy, "Casabianca" (1826), by British poet Felicia Dorothea Hemans (1783-1835). The poem opens:
The boy stood on the burning deck
Whence all but he had fled; ...
'quts': This transcription is uncertain, as is Guiney's meaning.
Shaws: These persons have not yet been identified.
Joshua in Ajalon: In the Christian Old Testament of the Bible, Joshua succeeds Moses as leader of the Hebrews after their departure from Egypt. In the story of the conquest of Canaan, Joshua begs God to stop the sun and prolong the daylight, so he can complete the final battle in the conquest in the Ajalon Valley.
Miss Jewett: Sarah Orne Jewett. See Key to Correspondents.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Huntington Library, San Marino, CA, in the James T. Fields collection Box 26: mss FI 1613. Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
William Gilman Perry to Sarah Orne Jewett
Dear Sarah
I received your kind letter in due time for which I am very much obliged. I find a letter that looks like home is particularly acceptable. I have received one from Lucretia* and one from little Fannie and I have been expecting [ another corrected ] from some one which I have not received though it may come quite soon. I have been trying to enjoy myself and while every thing has been done to please me, yet
I cannot make Exeter out of it any way I [ can continue ? ]. I have been around a little and seen many things to interest but still I am looking for the time to start for the east. I would give two or three Cincinnati enjoyments for one down to Berwick. I have been to see old Mrs Sawyers* and to Mrs Keiths who is not at home and Mrs Hall is away who is staying with her, Mrs Hatch is away I know but is [ unrecognized word ] home next Saturday. I have been also to view the moon and also [ Mr Mars ? ] little babies* which are talked so much about
but found the former no different than it was when I looked though a [ telescope corrected ] near seventy years ago and the latter did not make their appearance. The Astronomer said they were not to be seen only with an instrument of the greatest power. I have been also to see the collection of wild and foreign animals which for the [ size ? ] of it
as little boys and [ bark ? ] and will run into their holes [ where ? ] they are often attended with small owls and rattle snakes. The [ Jack ? ] stands in his stuffed [ skin corrected ] as dignified as when though wounded, he had knocked the lioness* over. I am highly pleased ^with^ the situation where John has located himself. It is to be sure a part of the city but it is so different in all respects that one can hardly [ realize ? ] that it belongs to it. It is a
Notes
Lucretia: Lucretia Morse Fisk Perry is Dr. Perry's wife; "little Fanny" presumably is their daughter, though at the time of this letter, she was about 36 years old, married with children. See Key to Correspondents.
Mrs Sawyers: The identity of Mrs. Sawyer remain uncertain. Possibly, she is Mary Abbott Gorham (1831-1934), wife of George C. Sawyer (1834-1914). After graduating from Harvard in 1855, George Sawyer served as principal of the Utica (NY) Free Academy (1858-1896) before moving to Cambridge, MA. Mary Sawyer, a correspondent of Sarah and Mary Jewett, was the daughter Dr. David Gorham (Harvard 1821, married to Deborah) of Exeter, NH, a probable associate of the Jewetts' grandfather, Dr. William Perry.
Mrs. Keith, Mrs. Hall and Mrs. Hatch have not been identified, but all are mentioned in Jewett's 1869 diary as people with whom she visited during a stay in Cincinnati, OH, where Dr. Perry's brother, John Taylor Perry resided. See Sarah Chandler Perry in Key to Correspondents.
babies: Transcription of this part of the letter is difficult, but it appears that Dr. Perry has visited a small observatory to view Earth's moon and also the moons of Mars, which had been observed first in 1877.
lioness: Dr. Perry's reference has not yet been discovered. Jack and Jennie are generic names for mules. Perhaps he refers to an animal fable such as the tale of the mule that puts on a lion's skin or of the old lion attacked by a boar, a bull, and a donkey, but those particular tales do not fit the details Perry presents.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the University of New England Maine Women Writers Collection, Sarah Orne Jewett Correspondence Box 1 Folder 035.
Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Wyman Whitman to Sarah Orne Jewett
[ September 26. 1897 ]*
Its a lovely story,* darling -- & I must tell you so with my love -- And done with [ deleted word ]
[ Page 2 ]
Martha's Lady made me feel too -- yet once more -- [ what ? ] the Art of Literature is in its divine [ robe ? ]. Such a garment, --- such Keys and Strings & pipes: -- such power of reaching [ through ? ] Heaven & Hell
[ Page 3 ]
to find the "mot désigner", & then [ hanging ?
] it in [ what ? ] a story of revelations!
[ That ? ] I am full of
joy that when the [ early ? ] god plucked the seed and
leaf he [ gave over ? ] into your hand, dear &
beloved friend.
_SW_*
September 26. 1897
Notes
1897: Whitman has dated this letter at the end. Unlike most of the letters in this Whitman folder at the Houghton, it lacks an accompanying envelope.
lovely story: Jewett's "Martha's Lady" appeared in Atlantic Monthly (80:523-533), October 1897.
swift: This letter contains attempted clarifications of the handwriting, apparently in pencil and by another hand. The writer has written all or part of the penciled word over the original ink. This is one example.
"mot désigner": This transcription is uncertain. If this is what Whitman wrote, then she probably means "the chosen word," in the sense of being chosen by a power beyond or outside the writer.
_SW_: Whitman has underlined
her signature twice.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Ellen Chase
South Berwick, September 27, 1897.
Dear Ellen, -- Thank you again, and
then once more for my little lemon-tree, which is keeping me
company again on the sunny window-seat here, close by my
secretary where I write. It has had a happy summer in the shade
of the lilacs (and yet not out of the sun all day), and at this
moment it has not many leaves, but no end of little lemons!!!
One of them is as large as the end of my thumb, -- so we must
not believe that so noble a lemon-tree condescends to the
Berwick climate. It always gives me great pleasure, and I love
to remember whence it came, with the delightful old associations
that every lemon-tree must always have, and the pleasant new
ones that you gave this special one.
Note
This letter appears in Annie Fields, Letters of Sarah Orne Jewett (1911), Transcribed by Annie Adams Fields, with notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.Sarah Orne Jewett to Sarah Wyman Whitman
[ 28 Sept 1897 ]*
South Berwick, Maine
[ End letterhead ]
Dear friend [it corrected ] is impossible to say how your letter has heartened me! I send you love and thanks -- it is one more unbreakable bond that holds fast between me and you. You bring something to the reading of a story that the story would go very lame without, but it is those
unwritable things that the story holds in its heart, if it has any! that make the true soul of it, and these must be understood and yet how many a story 'goes lame' for lack of that understanding! In France there is such a 'code' such recognitions, such richness of allusions, but
here we confuse our scaffoldings with our buildings, and -- and so! -----------
This I feel like talking all day about
if you were only here -- but I come down to my poor Martha;* I
thought that most of us had begun to grow in just such a way as
she did and so could read joyfully between the lines of her
plain story -- but I wonder if most people will not call
her a dull story? That would be all my fault and sets me the
harder at work, the stone ought to be made a lovely statue.
Nobody must say that Martha was dull, it is only me.
--- And dear Mrs. Lawrence* goes today, and she could not dine
up here after all the long-made plan. I was sadly
disappointed. I hope that she is really quite strong again
and I cant quite bear to think of her going to Florence. I
fear the sniffle that lives in Florence
in winter, and she has been so poorly all the month. My
darling, I may get to Manchester the very first of the week!
sooner if I could for I think that A. F.* will be alone
presently.
[ Up the left margin of page 2, then down the top margins of pages 2 and 3 ]
I am going to try to bring her here for a good long visit
before she begins to really live in town again. She
does not 'do well' in this windy weather, but what
splendid windy skies there are to look at! only the wind will
blow inside my head whenever it blows outside!
Yours always,
S.O.J.
Notes
28 September 1897: This date in another hand appears on the manuscript; it seems based on an attempt to read a very light postmark on the accompanying envelope. In 1897, 28 September fell on a Tuesday. Almost certainly, Jewett responds to Whitman's comments upon "Martha's Lady," which first appeared in Atlantic Monthly 80 (October 1897) pp. 523-533. It is likely, therefore, that this date is correct.Mrs. Lawrence: This may be Elizabeth Chapman Lawrence (1829-1905), one of Whitman's correspondents. See E.L., The Bread Box Papers: a biography of Elizabeth Chapman Lawrence, (1983) by Helen H. Gemmill. She was married to the diplomat, Timothy Bigelow Lawrence (d. 1869). Her home was the Aldie Mansion in Doylestown, PA.
A. F.: Annie Adams Fields. See Key to Correspondents.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University, Cambridge. MA: Whitman, Sarah (Wyman) 1842-1904, recipient. 25 letters; 1892-[1900] & [n.d.]. Sarah Orne Jewett additional correspondence, 1868-1930. MS Am 1743.1 (126).
Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
There are marks on the manuscript in pencil that presumably were made by Annie Fields as she prepared her transcriptions of The Letters of Sarah Orne Jewett (1911); these are omitted from this transcription.
Annie Fields included part of this letter in Letters of Sarah Orne Jewett (1911). Her transcription follows.
Dear Friend, -- It is impossible to say how your letter has heartened me. I send you love and thanks, -- it is one more unbreakable bond that holds fast between me and you. You bring something to the reading of a story that the story would go very lame without; but it is those unwritable things that the story holds in its heart, if it has any, that make the true soul of it, and these must be understood, and yet how many a story goes lame for lack of that understanding. In France there is such a code, such recognitions, such richness of allusions; but here we confuse our scaffoldings with our buildings, and -- and so!
This I feel like talking all day about, if you were only here, -- but I come down to my poor Martha: I thought that most of us had begun to grow in just such a way as she did, and so could read joyfully between the lines of her plain story, but I wonder if most people will not call her a dull story. That would be all my fault, and sets me the harder at work; the stone ought to be made a lovely statue. Nobody must say that Martha was dull, it is only I.Sarah Orne Jewett to Eliza and Hattie Stowe
October 5th
[ 1897 ]*
My dear friends
I never look at the little stamp box of your mother's which you so kindly sent me, without a great deal of pleasure and with reverence for a thing she used to handle and with which she must have had some pleasant associations. It was so good of you to give me anything of hers. I know that Mrs. Fields* thanked you for me but I keep remembering
no means all, and I am delighted with the way it goes on: The first two chapters are beautifully done it seems to me -- about Nut Plains and Litchfield &c: all much condensed but giving such real knowledge of your mother's childhood and inheritance. I well remember reading the Life of your grandfather to my grandmother when it came out and I was a little girl (early "broken in" to reading aloud!) and I have always delighted in those chapters about Easthampton & Nut Plains and Litchfield ever since{,} which --
which are made new again now. My grandmother had known the second Mrs. Beecher in Portland when she was young and the book was of greatest interest to her.
I often think of you, dear friends, and Mrs. Fields and I [ deletion ] talk much of you when we are together. I am sure you know how near you are to her heart. I hoped that I should see you both this summer at Manchester, but I was disappointed.
Sarah O. Jewett
1897: This letter probably was composed not long before the appearance of the Fields biography of Harriet Beecher Stowe. See note below.
Fields: Annie Adams Fields. Key to Correspondents.
new book: Early biographies of Harriet Beecher Stowe include Florine T. McCray's The Life-work of the Author of Uncle Tom's Cabin (1888), Charles Edward Stowe's Life of Harriet Beecher Stowe, compiled from her letters and journals by her son (1889), and Annie Fields's Life and Letters of Harriet Beecher Stowe (1897). Both the Stowe and Fields books feature images of Stowe, but Fields uses a photo of a portrait bust, and Stowe presents a drawing of a young Mrs. Stowe. I have found no biography published in Jewett's lifetime that contains a photograph of Stowe. Both Mr. Stowe and Fields open their books with chapters on Mrs. Stowe's ancestry, childhood and life at Litchfield, MA.
Jewett, then, seems to be reading Charles Stowe and anticipating Annie Fields, but the latter with a photograph of Stowe rather than of her portrait bust. This is my main reason for dating this letter to 1897.
Life of your grandfather: Almost certainly this was Autobiography, Correspondence, Etc., of Lyman Beecher, D.D. (2 volumes, 1866). Harriet Beecher Stowe's father was the American Presbyterian minister, Lyman Beecher (1775-1863).
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Schlesinger Library, Radcliffe Institute, Cambridge, MA, in the Beecher-Stowe family Papers, 1798-1956. Letters to the twins. from Sarah Orne Jewett (2 letters): Box: 5 Identifier: A-102: M-45, 280.
Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Richard Watson Gilder
1897*
South Berwick, Maine
[ End letterhead ]
Dear Mr. Gilder
Can you read this smudgy manuscript -- which I should have type written if my useful lieutenant were at hand ---- and see if it can have a place in The Century. It isn't long and it seems lively to its partial author, [ As corrected? ] for the price will you
----- It seems a long time since we have heard from you -- Mrs. Fields* tried to reach you (but could not)
S. O. Jewett
Dear Mr. Gilder
I have kept back my sketch a day or two -- fearing that I shall only give you the trouble of reading it -- that it is too slight perhaps for the [ Century changed to capitalized ] [. but intending a comma? ] [ deletion ] ^though^ the poor dependent & her patrons the farmers, may be clearly drawn. But I send it after all -- it is a good bit of fun too!
1897: Penciled to the left of the letterhead in another hand: "2739". Penciled in the upper right corner of page 4 is"RHT", presumably for American bibliophile Robert H. Taylor (c. 1914-1985).
Timms: Jewett's "The Guests of Mrs. Timms" appeared in Century Magazine in February 1894. After this letter, Jewett's next piece to appear in Century was "The Coon Dog," in August 1898.
Fields: Annie Adams Fields. See Key to Correspondents.
Hugh Wynne: A novel by Silas Weir Mitchell. See Key to Correspondents. Hugh Wynne, Free Quaker (1897) was serialized in Century in November 1896 through October 1897.
Mr. Woodberry's poem: George E. Woodberry. See Key to Correspondents. His poem, "The Blood Red Blossom," appeared in the October 1897 issue of Century, pp. 860-861, just before the final installment of Hugh Wynne.
The postscript contains somewhat ambiguous marks. The final phrase is in pencil. Also in pencil is a large open parenthesis on the left of the entire postscript, and -- again in pencil -- there is a line across the page beneath the postscript. It is not clear whether all of the penciled marks are by Jewett.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Princeton University Library, Princeton, NJ: Robert H. Taylor Collection of English and American Literature RTC01, Box 10, Folder 12. Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Henry Sweetser Burrage
MANCHESTER-BY-THE-SEA.
[ End letterhead ]
I had time to read the
very interesting accounts of the recovery of your sword;* and
almost all of the Longfellow volume* before I left home, but I
did not have time to write and thank you for them, as I meant to
do. The Memorial of Longfellow is very valuable; I found
your own paper to be of great interest.
It
gave me great pleasure to see you the other day, and I thank you again for the kindness of your visit, as well as for the proofs of your friendly remembrance.
Yours most sincerely
S. O. Jewett
Notes
sword: Brevet Major Henry S. Burrage presented "How I Recovered My Sword," a Civil War memoir, "before the Maine Commandery of the Military Order of the Loyal Legion of the United States on 1 December 1897." The presentation was published in The Maine Bugle Volumes 4-5 (1897), pp. 55-69.
volume: Scott Stoddart identified Burrage's "Henry
Wadsworth Longfellow and his Paternal Ancestry", which appeared
in Henry Wadsworth Longfellow: Seventy-fifth Birthday.
Proceedings of the Maine Historical Society, February 27, 1882
(Portland: Hoyt, Fogg and Donhara, 1882), pp. 29-51.
New transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Louise Imogen Guiney to Annie Adams Fields
Dearest Mrs. Fields:
The verbenas brought Mother joy last night. She says it is several years since she owned a verbena plant. Her thanks were going to you, she says also, in her own hand; but this morning, in sealing some bottles of grape juice, the burning wax fell over her fingers, and damped her spirits much more effectually than a wet blanket could! So I fall gracefully into my old trade of scribe. I shall enjoy growing things too, and inhale their praises of you 'from morn to dewy eve'.* (Sh! I remember that I mustn't quote. I must be a turn-quote, a brand saved from the burning!)*
The warm, moist, April-like day makes me hope you are not in the act, as yet, of forsaking your hill,* which will be lovely for a month to come. I am in a wrathful mood to see it so fair
outside, because I have been bedded slave to a violent cold, and am still red and inaudible, with alcohol, and camphorated oil, and things, insulting my immortal spirit. In this state of degradation, I have been doing book-reviews: odious chores they are, but befitting the no-witted. Best love to you, and the like to Miss Jewett,* whether you can pass it to her now, or later, in her ain countrie; and all pleasure to you both there!
L. I. G.
Notes
1897: This date was assigned by the Huntington Library. The choice is supported by Guiney's noting that 30 October and 6 November fall on Saturday, as they did in 1897.
'from morn to dewy eve' ... a brand saved from the burning: First, Guiney paraphrases British poet John Milton's (1608-1674) Paradise Lost, from the description of Lucifer's fall from heaven. Then, in admonishing herself not to quote, she quotes (without quotation marks!) from The Confessions (c. 400) of St. Augustine of Hippo (354-430).
It is possible that she is responding to a strongly negative review of her book, Patrins (1897), by Edward Everett Hale, Jr. in The Dial 23 (16 September, 1897) p. 145, in which he said: "To what is original is added a equal amount of quotation."
Guiney may be responding to this review as well in a letter to Fields possibly written on 26 August 1897, but it is not clear that the Hale review was available at the end of August, and some details in that letter suggest she responds to a different negative review.
forsaking your hill: Fields's summer home in Manchester-by-the-Sea, Massachusetts, stood on Thunderbolt Hill.
Miss Jewett: Sarah Orne Jewett. See Key to Correspondents.
Bruce Porter: California artist and critic Bruce Porter (1865-1953) collaborated with fellow artist and author Gelett Burgess (1866-1961) and William Doxey to publish a literary magazine, The Lark (1895-1897). Porter also contributed to the Robert Louis Stevenson Memorial in San Francisco, for which Guiney helped to raise the funds.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Huntington Library, San Marino, CA, in the James T. Fields collection Box 26: mss FI 1573 . Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Sara Norton
South Berwick, Maine, 28 October, 1897.
All these days I have thought of you often. It has been a hurried, unexpected sort of time with me, and a general sense of nothing happening quite as it ought to happen as if the North Star had got just a little bit out of its place toward the northwest. My eye just caught sight of your little photograph of the Levens Bridge,* perched on some papers at the back of my desk, and it gave a pleasing reassurance of the stability of England, even if the State of Maine has got joggled.*
I have had to go to Exeter several times lately, where I always find my childhood going on as if I had never grown up at all, with my grand-aunts and their old houses and their elm-trees and their unbroken china plates and big jars by the fireplaces. And I go by the house where I went to school, aged eight, in a summer that I spent with my grand-mother, and feel as if I could go and play in the sandy garden with little dry bits of elm-twigs stuck in painstaking rows. There are electric cars in Exeter* now, but they can't make the least difference to me!
In talking lately with S. W. E.* (she has great charm for me as I think you know) it seemed while she was speaking that her love for your mother had been growing all these years instead of fading out as so many old friendships do when one has gone away. As I write this I remember a verse which always touches me profoundly, --
"Come
mete me out my loneliness, O wind,
For I
would know
How far
the living who must stay behind
Are from
the dead who go."*
I am stepping upon very sacred ground* when I write about this,
dear child, but it has quite haunted me, that bit of talk with
S.W.E. She was thinking aloud, I believe, rather than talking to
me, and yet she told me a little story about you in your
childhood which made me know you as I never have known you
before, in such a near sweet way. As I grow older it has been
one of the best things in life to take up some of the old
friendships that my mother had to let fall, there is a double
sweetness in doing this, one feels so much of the pleasure of
those who seem to see something of their lost companionship
return.
Notes
Levens Bridge: Mrs. Humphry Ward did some of her writing at a country estate, Levens. See Correspondents.State of Maine has got joggled: It seems possible that Jewett is referring to an earthquake, but no quakes were recorded in Maine in 1897. But there were other disturbing events for Jewett in 1897, including the deaths of Jewett's sister, Carrie, and of Katherine Loring's father, Caleb, of Jewett's aunt, Sarah Chandler Perry, Also, Madame Blanc had made a long visit the previous summer.
electric cars in Exeter: Electric streetcars began operating in Exeter, NH in the summer of 1897.
S. W. E.: The identity of this woman is currently
mysterious. We can tell that she is an elderly friend of the
Jewett family, an old friend of Jewett's mother, and that she
had opportunity to observe Sara Norton as a child.
Are from the dead who go: "Mete Me Out My Loneliness" is by Michael Field, the pseudonym of Katherine Harris Bradley (d. 1913) and her niece Edith Emma Cooper (d. 1914). Their books include Long Ago (1897), "the extension of Sappho's fragments into lyrics," with Greek text, and Whym Chow, Flame of Love (1914). Below is the complete text of this poem as it appears in the anthology, Poetry of the Nineties (1926), edited by C. E. Andrews and M. O. Percival.
Come, mete me out my loneliness, O wind,For I would know
How far the living who must stay behind
Are from the dead who go.
Eternal Passer-by, I feel there is
In thee a stir,
A strength to span the yawning distances
From her gravestone to her.
sacred ground: Sara Norton's mother died in 1872, the year Sara turned 8 years old.
This letter appears in Annie Fields, Letters of Sarah Orne Jewett (1911), Transcribed by Annie Adams Fields, with notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Annie Adams Fields
Thursday evening, [probably June 1886 and/or October 1897].*
This table is so overspread with the story of the Normans that I can hardly find room to put my paper down on it. I started in for work this afternoon, having been on the strike long enough, as one might say; but I only did a little writing, for I found that I must read the whole thing through, I have forgotten so much of it.
Do read Miss Preston's paper about Pliny the younger in the "Atlantic." It is full of charming things, and as readable as possible. It sent me to my old favorite, the elder Pliny's "Natural History," but I couldn't find it in any of the book-cases downstairs, and I was too lazy to go up for it. Oh, you should see the old robin by my bed-room window a-fetching up her young family! I long to have you here to watch the proceedings. She is a slack housekeeper that robin, for the blown-away ruffles that she wove into her nest have suffered so much from neglect, combined with wind and weather, that they ravel out in unsightly strings. But oh, the wide mouths of the three young ones, -- how they do reach up and gape altogether when she comes near the nest with a worm! How can she attend to the mural decorations of her home? I am getting to be very intimate with the growing family. I hate every pussy when I think what a paw might do. I waited by the window an hour at tea-time, spying them.
I have finished "Pendennis" with deep regret, for I have enjoyed it enormously. It is truly a great story, more simple and sincere and inevitable than "Vanity Fair."* It seems as much greater than Tolstoi's "Anna Karenina"* as it is more full of true humanity. It belongs to a more developed civilization, to a far larger interpretation of Christianity. But people are not contented at reading "Pendennis" every few years and with finding it always new as they grow more able to understand it. Thackeray is so great, a great Christian. He does not affect, he humbly learns and reverently tries to teach out of his own experience. "Pendennis" belongs to America just now more than it belongs to England, but we must forget it and go and read our Russian. Yes, he has a message too, but most people understand it so little that he amuses them and excites their wonder like Jules Verne.*
I am writing before breakfast. I have
finished "Hugh Wynne"* and loved it, with its fresh air and
manliness, and -- to me -- exquisite charm. Don't you know what
Tennyson said: "I love those large still books!"
Notes
1896: Annie Fields dates this letter in
1886. David Schuster points out the inconsistency between
the publication date of Mitchell's Hugh Wynne (1896)
and the apparent date of this letter. Furthermore, the
quotation from Tennyson at the end of the letter comes from
letters of Edward Fizgerald published in 1895 (see below).
Mitchell's novel was serialized in Century Magazine
(November 1896 through October 1897). Jewett seems quite
definite that she has finished reading the whole book; therefore
the final two paragraphs could not have been written before
October of 1897.
However, the first two paragraphs could come
from spring of 1886. Jewett reports trying to return to
work on The Normans, which appeared at the end of 1886,
and the Preston paper she recommends appeared in June
1886. Jewett reports researching on Normans as early as
1885 in a "Monday Evening" letter to Fields.
While it is possible that she has forgotten
work she was doing a year or more earlier, she sounds as if she
is returning to writing she has completed before after being "on
strike." This might suggest that she is working not on the
original book, but on a later related piece, such as "England
After the Norman Conquest," prepared for an 1891 Chautauqua
course on British History and Literature. Based on her history,
this piece appeared in The Chautauquan 12
(1891):438-442, 574-578, 707-711.
However, the first two paragraphs seem
clearly to have been written in the spring, when robin
hatchlings are being fed. It is possible that Jewett was
working on the Chautauqua piece six months before it was due,
but we know that she did not start work on minor revisions to The
Normans until December of 1890 (See G. H. Putnam's letter
to Jewett of December 17, 1890).
To add to this confusion, Jewett again
reports reading Thackeray's Pendennis in what seems
almost certainly to be the autumn of 1887, when she is reading
proof for "Law Lane," which appeared in December 1887: See her
letter, Sunday evening, [Autumn] 1887.
Until we are able to see the original
manuscript(s), it would seem we cannot confidently explain this
letter. For this reason, it appears in two different
years: 1886 and 1897.
Miss Preston's paper about Pliny the younger in the "Atlantic": Harriet Waters Preston (1836-1911), a writer and translator, was one of those from whom Jewett sought advice early in her career. See Blanchard, pp. 108-9. Pliny, the Younger (62-113) was a Roman official who published several volumes of official and private letters that provide rich pictures of aspects of Roman life. Preston's article was "A Roman Gentleman under the Empire," Atlantic 57 (June 1886) 741-761.
Pliny's "Natural History": Pliny the Elder (c. 23-79) was a Roman encyclopedist. His "Natural History" consisted of 37 books, ten published in his lifetime, on all aspects of contemporary science.
Pendennis ... Vanity Fair: William Makepeace Thackeray, an English fiction writer, published Vanity Fair in 1847-8 and Pendennis in 1848-50.
Tolstoi's "Anna Karenina": The Russian novelist, Count Leo Tolstoy (1828-1910) published his novel, Anna Karenina 1875-1877.
Jules Verne: French author Jules Verne (1828-1905) is considered one of the inventors of science fiction. Many of his novels have been adapted to film, including Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea (1870, Eng. trans. 1873) and Around the World in Eighty Days (1873, Eng. trans. 1873).
"Hugh Wynne": Hugh Wynne, Free Quaker (1896) is
a novel by Silas Weir Mitchell, M.D. (1829-1914), perhaps best
remembered for his "rest cure" for hysteria. This
novel was first published as a serial in Century Magazine,
November 1896 - October 1897.
The quotation from Tennyson appears in Letters
of
Edward
FitzGerald to Fanny Kemble (1871-1883), by Edward
FitzGerald (1895), p. 138.
Soon after returning
home
_______
I must write at once to tell you again how very glad I have been to be with you just now. Somehow the weight of affairs is sometimes, (to me) a little easier not [ unrecognized word ] when I have a friend to speak to between=whiles [ so writteni ] and I think in my heart that it has been so with you. In any event you have made me feel so and I thank you!
We have had a very easy pleasant
trip. That train is a good one.
I fear in some way I have dropped the first half of the very pretty [ unrecogized word dides ? ] you gave me. I do not find it here -- only the overdress. I am sorry to add anything to your labors but it is a [ unrecogized word ] to divide the parts by accident leaving neither of them of any use.
Your famous chopper has just arrived.
Again and always many many thanks.
I hope this day has given you a little brightness in your work.
Please give my love to "Aunt [ unrecognized name ]{.}" Sarah will soon be with you again.
Truly always and
[ Brayly ? ]
The manuscript of this letter is held by Historic New England in Letters from Annie Fields to Mary Rice Jewett, Jewett Family Papers: Transcribed and annotated by Terry Heller. Coe College.
Richard Watson Gilder to Sarah Orne Jewett
EDITORIAL - DEPARTMENT
The CENTURY - MAGAZINE
UNION - SQUARE - NEW - YORK
R. U. JOHNSON,
ASSOCIATE EDITOR.
C. C. RUEL.
ASSISTANT EDITOR.
[ End letterhead ]
My dear miss Jewett,
Those are delightful dogs!*
[ yours ? ]
Notes
dogs: Probably this constitutes an informal acceptance letter for Jewett's "The Coon Dog," which appeared in Century Magazine in August 1898.
The typescript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University: Sarah Orne Jewett Correspondence I, Letters to Sarah Orne Jewett.
Gilder, Richard Watson, 1844-1909. 1 letter; 1897. (80).
This transcription is from a photocopy held by the Maine Women Writer's Collection, University of New England, Letters from Sarah Orne Jewett, 1875-1890, Box 2, Folder 99, Burton Trafton Jewett Research Collection.
Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Mr. Bacon
Boston. Novr 14th
[ 1897-1900 ]*
My dear Mr. Bacon*
Your note finds me in town but I shall be glad to send you a photograph of my house in South Berwick next week. The photograph of myself is more difficult. The one that my friends like best was taken a few years ago by Mr. Hollyer of London,* and there has been a copy made from it lately by The Critic company in New York which might serve your purpose. You will find it -- also a plate for the house photograph
which I meant to send you -- in the October Critic.* Suppose you look at these and let me know if they will not do. It would save you the trouble of having new plates made! Believe me with sincere regard
S. O. Jewett
I said that the 'photograph of myself' was more difficult because it happens that I have none just now! I am sending over for some copies but they will not be here for some time probably, in these dark London days printing is so difficult.*
Notes
1897-1900: These dates are speculative, as indicated by the notes. As the Hollyer photograph was made in 1892, this letter must come later. If Mr. Bacon is correctly identified, then it is likely that he solicited photographs related to Jewett in order to prepare a piece for The Time and the Hour, during his 1897-1900 editorship. With access to issues of The Critic and The Time and the Hour, one could presumably date this letter more precisely.
Mr. Bacon: This person has not been identified. A likely candidate is Edwin Monroe Bacon (1844-1916), a prominent Boston newspaperman, who, during much of Jewett's career, was editor of the Boston Post and other local publications. See The Book of Boston (1916), pp. 520-27;
Mr. Hollyer of London: Frederick Hollyer (1838-1933) was an English photographer and engraver, known in part for his portraits of literary and artistic figures. In 1892, he made the familiar portrait of Jewett at a table, reading a book, that Annie Fields included in her collection of Jewett letters.
Detail from the Hollyer photograph of 1892
October Critic: This item has not yet been located.
difficult: On the unused side of page 2, at the bottom, is a penciled note, presumably by Mr. Bacon: Wrote to Mifs [ so spelled ] Gilder for the Critic pictures. She replies that she sent them all to Houghton Mifflin, &Co. I keep her note to show Garrison when I call, also a note which Mifs Jewett later sent me giving her permission to use them.
Miss Gilder is Jeannette L. Gilder (1849-1916), sister of the poet Richard Watson Gilder. See Key to Correspondents.
Jeannette Gilder was an editor, journalist and literary critic. With her brother, Joseph Gilder, she founded The Critic (1881-1906), an influential literary magazine, where she served as editor and writer.
Garrison is Francis Jackson Garrison at Houghton, Mifflin. See Key to Correspondents.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Small Library, University of Virginia, Special Collections MSS 6218, Sarah Orne Jewett Papers. Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Annie Adams Fields to Thomas Bailey Aldrich
Nov. 17th 1897
Dear friend:
I am reading your volumes* through poem by poem daily like a prayer=book! with new joy and appreciation.
Thank you for sending me such a mine of wealth.
I went to your door in the rain yesterday, to say rather than write these poor words but you were both away.
Please accept the book* which goes with this and believe me
most affectionately yours and Lilian's
Notes
volumes: In 1897, The Poems of Thomas Bailey Aldrich appeared, 8 volumes in an illustrated edition.
book: If Fields gave Aldrich one of her own books, then probably it was Life and Letters of Harriet Beecher Stowe (1897).
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University: Thomas Bailey Aldrich Papers, MS Am 1429, Box 6, Items 1446-1538. Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Thomas Bailey Aldrich
South Berwick, Maine
[ End letterhead ]
My dear Friend
You must have thought me very unmindful of your kindness -- but it happened that the two books* of your poems went to Charles Street and I did not get them until after A.F.'s* return when she sent them down. There I was just going to town -- at the end of last week -- when I meant to go to see you, but I was attacked by four colds in one and so now
I am very late indeed in sending my thanks. I have read much if I haven't written and I am full of delight in your beautiful work. I see how much thought and skill you have spent on this late revision -- I cannot say how beautiful it is sometimes where you have brought your master's hand to touch some of the earlier work with all its rush of feeling -- the boy's eager fancy and light imagination
and the trained poet to choose the final word; -- it has been this all the way that gave your work such beauty -- and it is always going to be this! It is hard not to read these books without constant personal feeling and association, but I believe that I can do it at least sometimes! You hardly know what deep associations the poems have for me, how they bring up days and years and the remembrance of first readings, and readings with this person and that, and remembrance of myself
when I read them first. It is like a subtler sort of history and biography of you and Lilian* -- and of me! I could say many things of many a poem. I thought I knew them all but they all seem new in these books, as new as they seem old in the sense of always having been mine.
With love and thanks
Sarah O. Jewett
Notes
two books: In 1897, Aldrich published two books, The Story of a Bad Boy and The Poems of Thomas Bailey Aldrich: Revised and Complete Household Edition.
A.F.: Annie Adams Fields. See Key to Correspondents.
Lilian: Lilian Woodman Aldrich. See Key to Correspondents.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library, Harvard University, Cambridge, Mass. Thomas Bailey Aldrich Papers, 119 letters of Thomas Bailey and Lilian Woodman Aldrich, 1837-1926. MS Am 1429 (117). Transcribed and annotated by Terry Heller, Coe College.
At the bottom left of page one, in another hand, is a circled number: 2756.
Sally A. Kaighn* to Sarah Orne Jewett
1897
My dear friend
May I once more talk to thee a little while on paper? as I shall never have the privilege of seeing thee in thy own home and having a quiet hour together. Thee knows I am one of thy old women which one I hardly know.
The other evening, I was reading over again that sweet little story of the "Empty Purse"* which was published in the "Transcript"
many of them here in New Jersey -- it seemed like a cool bracing air from your sea swept islands, and revived me like the herbs from the upland pastures{.} It is simply a perfect book, and one can go to it again and again for comfort, even poor Joanna's history had its lesson which some of us can understand. Have you really such dear people as Mrs Todd and her mother with you yet anywhere in New England?
But I must close, and just want to say right here, please believe this is not written with any expectation ^or wish*^ of a reply -- The dear letter thee so kindly wrote me last Spring has been kept carefully in my desk & read more than once but not displayed to others -- Please just throw this into the fire when read. I often think of thy dear sister Mary* and thyself and hope you are well, and that life yet holds many rich blessings for you after all of its sorrows and bitter losses. One cannot put ones love and earnest wishes into words
Most gratefully and lovingly thy friend S A Kaighn
Notes
Kaighn: This person has not yet been identified.
"Empty Purse": Jewett's "An Empty Purse" appeared in a number of newspapers in December 1895 and December 1896. Kaighn's idea for a booklet was realized after a fashion in a privately printed edition from Merrymount Press in 1905.
"Miss Sydneys flowers" ... "Late Tea" ... "Farmer Finchs daughter": "Miss Sydney's Flowers" and "A Late Supper" were collected in Old Friends and New (1879). "Farmer Finch" appeared in Harper's Magazine in January 1885 and was collected in A White Heron (1886).
Pointed Firs: Mrs. Todd and Joanna are characters in Jewett's 1896 novel, The Country of the Pointed Firs.
wish: It is not clear that Kaighn included "or" in this insert.
Mary: Mary Rice Jewett. Key to Correspondents.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University, Cambridge, MA. bMS Am 1743 Box 3, Item 121 I. Letters to Sarah Orne Jewett.
Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Owen Wister
30 November 1897
My dear Mr. Wister
I was later than I meant to be in reading Destiny at Drybone* and I now feel quite belated in telling you how much I thank you for the pleasure and pride so fine a piece of work has given me. When I see how you have 'managed' some of your 'incidents' I cannot help saying as Swinburne* did
to Landor -- "The youngest to the oldest Singer"! -- It is no use to say that it is not a terrible sort of literary material, but great artists must take terrible materials in their Russian stories, in their Tom Jones, in the Vanity Fairs if you like. It is the valley for the making of souls with which poor Keats* once confronted himself as he wrote a letter!
But when art is large enough it brings an atmosphere, a softening
mist of compassion: it [has corrected ] the power to "make the people of a state understand each other" but it also shows the valley in relation to the sky.
When I came to the end of that wonderful passage and the wind 'moved the kings and aces in the grass' it moved something very deep in my heart{.}
Believe me with great regard and highest hope
Yours most sincerely
S. O. Jewett
Notes
Destiny at Drybone: Owen Wister's "Destiny at Drybone" appeared in Harper's New Monthly Magazine Volume 96 Issue 571 (December, 1897), pp. 60-81. After the burial depicted in part 3, the narrator describes the scene: "In Drybone's deserted quadrangle the sun shone down upon Lusk still sleeping, and the wind shook the aces and kings in the grass." This story was incorporated into Wister's novel, Lin McLean (1897).
Swinburne ... "The youngest to the oldest Singer": Algernon Charles Swinburne (1837 - 1909) was an English author, best remembered as a poet. The line is from stanza 6 of "In Memory of Walter Savage Landor":
I came as one whose thoughts half linger,Russian stories, in their Tom Jones, in the Vanity Fairs: Which Russian stories Jewett had in mind is of course uncertain, though it is know that she read both Leo Tolstoy and Ivan Turgenev. The History of Tom Jones (1749) is the best-known novel of the British novelist and dramatics, Henry Fielding (1707-1754). Vanity Fair (1847-48) is the best-known novel of the British novelist William Makepeace Thackeray (1811-1863).
Half run before;
The youngest to the oldest singer
That England bore.
the valley for the making of souls ... Keats: In a letter to his siblings, George and Georgiana, of "Sunday Morn Feby 14th," 1819, the British poet, John Keats (1795-1821) says:
The common cognomen of this world among the misguided and superstitious is 'a vale of tears' from which we are to be redeemed by a certain arbitrary interposition of God and taken to Heaven - What a little circumscribed straightened notion! Call the world if you Please "The vale of Soul-making". Then you will find out the use of the world (I am speaking now in the highest terms for human nature admitting it to be immortal which I will here take for granted for the purpose of showing a thought which has struck me concerning it) I say 'Soul making' Soul as distinguished from an Intelligence- There may be intelligences or sparks of the divinity in millions - but they are not Souls till they acquire identities, till each one is personally itself.The manuscript of this letter is held by the Library of Congress in the Owen Wister Papers, 1829-1966, MSS46177, Box 25. Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Annie Adams Fields to Mary Rice Jewett
My dear Mary:
You can't guess what a surprise it was to see dear "Stubby"* walk in yesterday looking so much better.
This morning comes another surprise -- an offering from John Tucker* of a portion of his [apple ? ] pie -- Will you thank him from me sincerely. Tell him we shall say "thank you" afresh many times before this generous portion is eaten up.
But thank you above all and especially dear Mary for my delightful Thanksgiving visit -- I shall look for you in town at Christmas time if not before.
Annie Fields.
Notes
Stubby: Theodore Jewett Eastman. See Key to Correspondents.
John Tucker: See Key to Correspondents.
The manuscript of this letter is held by Historic New England in Letters from Annie Fields to Mary Rice Jewett, Jewett Family Papers: Transcribed and annotated by Terry Heller. Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Marie Thérèse de Solms Blanc
1 December [ 1897 ]*
Dearest Thérèse I have come to town for a few days and I find the Revue with your beautiful paper.* I cannot tell you with what joy and delight I have read it -- all those hours live again for me and shine more than ever with a lovely light from the sun of our friendship{.} But oh how I wish to
see you! -- You have done this piece of work in quite a wonderful way, "mon cher maitre" -- I suppose that I appreciate your great gift better for knowing so well the material upon which it now spends itself.
I have only time to say this and to send my note flying to the post to catch
this steamer. Annie* is very well and town very busy. At home [ deletion ] our friends have come to the lonely house. It begins to seem long since I heard from you.
With dearest pride in your work and love for you,
Notes
1897: Richard Cary assigned this date, but his rationale is not especially obvious. Cary believed the subject of the letter was the Blanc essay he identified (see note below). That Jewett's letter is dated 1 December suggests that she would have just seen an essay published in November. Of many essays on her American travels that Blanc published, this one may be most directly concerned with material that Jewett knew well.
paper: Cary identified the paper:
"Le Communisme en Amérique," Revue des Deux Mondes, CXLIV (November 15, 1897), 300-335; one section, subtitled, "Une Visite chez les Shakers," describes the visit made by Miss Jewett and Madame Blanc to the Shaker Colony in Alfred, Maine. See also:" Carl J. Weber, "New England Through French Eyes Fifty Years Ago," New England Quarterly, XX (September 1947), 385-396.Annie: Annie Adams Fields. See Key to Correspondents.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Colby College Special Collections, Waterville, ME: JEWE.1. Richard Cary included his transcription in Sarah Orne Jewett Letters.
New transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Owen Wister to Sarah Orne Jewett
Wednesday, Dec. 2d 1897
328, Chestnut Street [printed letterhead]
Philadelphia
My dear Miss Jewett:
How welcome is your letter, & how welcome your [word?] about the aces and Kings!* That is the way they looked in the quadrangle at Fort [Kitterman?] in September 1885, and the man walking with me thought them humorous. So they were, [on top?]; but they have haunted me for twelve years. One can never do more than hope one's intimate feeling about something has got out through one's pen -- and my hope now is that you may not have met me more than half way and with your subtlety divined the sky I tried to put above that sordid valley. No, not put, but point out. The Eternal's all close, there.
And never anywhere on the world's face can nature more [potently?] have accompanied -- like an orchestra -- the human doings of our frontier. No traveler, no artist seems to have felt, or anyhow compassed the expression of its legendary and supernatural charm. Wagner's music* is the only thing like it; and I'm not sure but that music is the only art adequate for it. If Remington* could paint as well as he draws, he'd be the man. But alas for landscape in fiction! One does not indulge oneself. Think of Miss Murfries.*
You've no notion how much pleasure your note has been.
Very sincerely yours
Owen Wister
Notes
aces and Kings: This phrase appears in Owen Wister's novel, Lin McLean (1897), at the end of chapter 19. Though his handwriting is difficult in this sentence, it is possible that he wrote "Fort Washakie," which is the Wyoming setting for this novel. Jewett has read Wister's "Destiny at Drybone," which appeared in Harper's New Monthly Magazine Volume 96 Issue 571 (December, 1897), pp. 60-81, and was incorporated into the novel. After the burial depicted in part 3 of this story, the narrator describes the scene: "In Drybone's deserted quadrangle the sun shone down upon Lusk still sleeping, and the wind shook the aces and kings in the grass."
Wagner: Wilhelm
Richard Wagner (1813 - 1883) "was a German composer,
theatre director, polemicist, and conductor who is primarily
known for his operas ... [notably] the four-opera cycle Der
Ring des Nibelungen (The Ring of the Nibelung)."
Remington: Frederic
Sackrider Remington (1861 - 1909) "was an American
painter, illustrator, sculptor, and writer who specialized in
depictions of the Old American West."
Miss Murfries: Mary
Noailles Murfree (1850 - 1922) "was an American ... writer
of novels and short stories who [published] under the pen name
Charles Egbert Craddock. She is considered by many to be
Appalachia's first significant female writer and her work a
necessity for the study of Appalachian literature, although a
number of characters in her work reinforce negative stereotypes
about the region."
The ms. of this letter is held by the Houghton Library, Harvard University: bMS Am 1743 (241). Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Sarah Wyman Whitman
[ 4 December 1897 ]*
I did so wish to have a look at you today dear -- just to make sure that you were better, but you were not at the studio and then I did not have time to go to 77 before I came away. But do be careful darling -- you are gallant enough heaven knows! but it takes a great piece of your strength when
you go through an illness [ without corrected ] fear and* without reproach! Oh I can hear your poor cough now! I hope that you are better than yesterday but it is hard weather -----
And this is Saturday morning and I dreamed about you, a great long worrying dream last night. I hope it goes by its contrary and that you are not ill and I not away from you and wondering if they were really taking care of
you inside the room -- But in the dream I did get to you at last and you asked me to take something and take care of it, some letters that you had been fretting about. And then I waked up and had quite a foolish sense of missing you as if it were better to be dreaming of you ill than to wake up to Berwick where you [ are corrected ] !!! I dont know why my pen goes on writing all this -- but indeed I often go on dreaming about you and living with you ---.
= I just want to send you these letters darling and you can just put them by till I come again. Miss Sally A. Knight* is such a very dear old person -- I showed you her first letter which my sister had answered while I was off at sea and you loved it as I did, and I sent her a Pointed Firs last winter and now she writes again. I feel a great sense of pleasure in her being alive. And the other letter all so forward-looking is full of manliness! I said something in my note about the terrible material which makes such stories, thinking of a Lear
of the Steppe by Turgenieff* -- and others and of Keats* copying in [ a corrected ] letter that this world is a valley for the making of souls ---- and that Art
I find great delight in this note! -- I cannot say what high hopes of a great future this last story gives me. " ---- the wind shook the Kings and aces in the grass"!* Ah, it is things just like that, which haunt
the mind for twelve years and write themselves at last, that belong -- whether little or great -- to Literature.
(I thank you for so much!)
S.O.J.
I left a little portrait for you which was new to me and which you might like to keep for Tomorrow.
Notes
1897: Next to this letter in the Houghton folder containing this set of Jewett's letters to Whitman is an envelope addressed to Whitman at 77 Mount Vernon St., Boston, cancelled as received in Boston on 8 April 1897, but that date cannot be correct, for several reasons, one being that 8 April fell on a Thursday in 1897.
Still, the year almost certainly is correct, supported as it is by Jewett mentioning that she presented a copy of her The Country of the Pointed Firs (1896) to Miss Knight the previous winter. That she seems to have just read an Owen Wister story in the December 1897 Harper's would suggest that this letter actually was composed in late November or December of 1897.
This Houghton folder has been shuffled a good deal, making it difficult to determine which pages go together and which envelopes belong with which letters. There is another envelope addressed to Whitman at 77 Mount Vernon Street, Boston, cancelled on the back as received 4 December 1897. This envelope probably belongs with this letter, especially since 4 December fell on Saturday in 1897.
See also Wister to Jewett of 2 December 1897.
and: Jewett often writes "a" with a long tail for "and." I render these as "and."
Sally A. Knight: This person has not yet been identified. Among Jewett's known correspondents was Helen Caroline Cross Knight; whether these two persons are related has not yet been discovered. Key to Correspondence.
Turgenieff: King Lear of the Steppes (1870) by Russian author, Ivan Turgenev (1818-1883). Wikipedia.
Keats: British poet John Keats (1795-1821). In a letter to George and Georgiana Keats of April 1819, Keats writes: "Call the world if you please 'The vale of Soul-making' " (The Letters of John Keats, London 1895, p. 326). Wikipedia.
the grass: Jewett refers to Owen Wister's "Destiny at Drybone," which appeared in Harper's New Monthly Magazine Volume 96 Issue 571 (December, 1897), pp. 60-81. Key to Correspondents.
See also Wister to Jewett of 2 December 1897.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University, Cambridge, MA. bMS Am 1743 Box 6, Item 277.
Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Harriet Jackson Lee Morse*
[ End letterhead ]
Dearest Mrs Morse
I was looking among some treasured letters a day or two ago, and I re-read this from Colonel Lee* with such delight and* pleasure [ that corrected ] I cant help sending it to you and dear Fanny to enjoy with me --
-- We had lately been lunching together at Mrs. Whitman's,* and had such a talk! I was so touched and delighted at his clear remembrance of the road
from York to South Berwick over which he had driven once a good many years before, and we talked about my old Berwick and its houses and old [ parishes ? ], as if we were made of the same Berwick dust. I have always missed those beautiful letters and brief 'papers' signed with his H.L. in the [ Advertiser ? ] -- how he would have said things that nobody else would think to say about our S.W.! -- and I am always wishing that such distinguished
-- I am so often thinking of you and Fanny if I do not write -- and I dont forget one of your dear and kind letters -- they have been such dear letters! Perhaps I shall get to town before long for a little while, and then you will see me coming
along to say things instead of trying to write!
With [ true ? ] love to you both Yours always
It was so nice to hear about Mr. H. James!*
Notes
Morse: See Frances (Fanny) Rollins Morse in Key to Correspondents.
1897 The last year of Jewett's life in which 13 December fell on Monday was 1897. If she dated her letter correctly, this is likely to be the year she wrote it.
and: Sometimes in this letter, Jewett writes an "a" with a long tail for "and." I render these as "and."
Colonel Lee: Boston banker and author, Colonel Henry Lee (1817- 24 November 1898). His wife was Elizabeth Perkins Cabot (1823-1909). Lee was a friend of Fanny Kemble, and published an article on her in Atlantic Monthly after her death in January 1893. It was reprinted in Memoir of Colonel Henry Lee (1905), prepared by John T. Morse, Jr. (1840-1937), Mrs. Morse's nephew.
Whitman: Sarah Wyman Whitman. Key to Correspondents.
Kemble: British actor, Frances (Fanny) Kemble (1809-1893). Wikipedia.
Houghton: Oscar Houghton died in 1895. Key to Correspondents.
H. James: Henry James. Key to Correspondents.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University, Cambridge, MA. bMS Am 1743.1 (123) Box 4, II. Letters from Sarah Orne Jewett.
Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Mary Rice Jewett
Saturday morning [ 18 December 1897 ]
Dear Mary
You are missed very much in this house. A. F.* feels better and had a timely note from the kind hand of Mr. Mifflin* this morning to say that they were advertising the fifth thousand of Mrs. Stowe tomorrow -- which means that they must have sold a thousand since I saw him the first of the week when the 4th was announced with great pride.
Notes
18 December 1897: As the notes below indicate,
Fields's biography of Harriet Beecher Stowe appeared in
1897. It seems reasonable to infer from the rate of sales
Jewett reports that it quickly sold more than 4000 copies.
Jewett mentions the sales of t his title in her 19 December 1897
letter to Robert Underwood Johnson.
A.F.: Annie Adams Fields. See Key to Correspondents.
Mr. Mifflin: George Harrison Mifflin (1845–1921)
was an early partner of Henry Oscar Houghton (See Key
to
Correspondents). Together they formed the Houghton,
Mifflin publishing company in 1880.
fifth thousand of Mrs. Stowe: Houghton, Mifflin
published Annie Fields's Life and Letters of Harriet Beecher Stowe
in 1897.
This text is from transcriptions from mixed repositories in the
Maine Women Writer's Collection, University of New England,
Letters from Sarah Orne Jewett, 1875-1890, Folder 74, Burton
Trafton Jewett Research Collection. For more information about
the individual transcription, contact the Maine Women Writers
Collection. Preparation by Linda Heller. Notes by
Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Robert Underwood Johnson
148 Charles Street
Boston 19 December
[ Sunday 1897 ]*
Dear Mr. Johnson
I am very late in
sending you my best thanks for your new book of poems,* but just
as I came up to town and found it, Mrs. Fields* fell
ill, and I have put by almost all my letters, and turned to
reading aloud to a poor dear person who was commanded by her
doctor to listen and not to talk. And you know
[ very corrected ] well how fast the winter days can fly
fly when one is living a good deal in an
invalid room. I am glad to say that Mrs. Fields is much better
-- I do not know whether she had written you her thanks for the
Songs of Liberty, but I shall say again how
affectionately she really did thank you! I find that The
Wistful Days* is my favorite; I care very much about it, and
just as
it spoke to me at first, so, as I think about all the poems,
it shines [ brightest corrected ] to me now. I cannot
exactly say why I care more for it than any poem I ever read of
yours, but the fact remains that I do, and so I will not stop to
hunt for reasons.
I hope that you and Mistress
Katharine* are beginning the winter well -- the last I really
heard about you was in France. My last
letters from Madame Blanc* have been very cheerful -- Goodbye,
with kindest wishes for a happy Christmas from your sincere
friend
Sarah O. Jewett
Mrs. Fields's book about Mrs. Stowe* is having really a great
success and brings her much pleasure, especially just now. I am
sure that you will care about it --
1897: Richard Cary assigned this date, supported by the publication that year of Johnson's Songs of Liberty and Fields's biography of H. B. Stowe.
poems: Johnson's Songs of Liberty and Other Poems (1897).
Mrs. Fields: Annie Adams Fields. See Correspondents.
"The Wistful Days": Johnson's poem is included in Edmund Clarence Stedman's An American Anthology, 1787–1900 (1900):
WHAT is there wanting in the Spring?
The air is soft as yesteryear;
The happy-nested green is here,
And half the world is on the wing.
The morning beckons, and like balm
Are westward waters blue and calm.
Yet something’s wanting in the Spring.
What is it wanting in the Spring?
O April, lover to us all,
What is so poignant in thy thrall
When children’s merry voices ring?
What haunts us in the cooing dove
More subtle than the speech of Love,
What nameless lack or loss of Spring?
Let Youth go dally with the Spring,
Call her the dear, the fair, the young;
And all her graces ever sung
Let him, once more rehearsing, sing.
They know, who keep a broken tryst,
Till something from the Spring be missed
We have not truly known the Spring.
Mistress Katharine: Katharine McMahon Johnson. See Correspondents.
Madame Blanc: Marie Thérèse de Solms Blanc. See Correspondents.
Stowe: Fields's Life and Letters of Harriet Beecher Stowe (1897).
The manuscript of this letter is held by Colby College Special Collections, Waterville, ME: JEWE.1. Richard Cary included his transcription in Sarah Orne Jewett Letters.
New transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Louisa Loring Dresel
I hope you will use this little Spanish bowl sometimes when you are making a great splash with a fine big water colour! Much love and a merry Christmas from
328 Beacon St.
Notes
Christmas 1897: Though speculative, this date is somewhat corroborated by having evidence that Jewett gave Dresel a bowl as a Christmas gift in 1897. See her letter to Dresel dated after December 25, 1897.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Columbia University (New York) Library in Special Collections, Jewett. Transcription from a microfilm copy and annotation by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Elizabeth Cabot Cary Agassiz to Annie Adams Fields
Quincy Street,
Cambridge.
[ End letterhead ]
My dear friend
With all my heart and with Christmas love and wishes I thank you for the check and the dear note which accompanies it -- Yuletide is a lovely season spite of frost & snow when the warm memories, [ whether ? ] of summer or winter, come back to give us new [ faith ? ] & hope --
That was a delightful day
for me at Nahant -- How cordial Madame Blanc* has been in all her relations with this foreign land where she has really seemed to feel herself at home -- I wonder how it has fared with her [ since ? ] her return? --
Have you really sent me your book? I have just put it up [ for ? ] a friend and I had
such a longing to keep it myself but just at this season when one is sending remembrances to friends, one hesitates to make gifts to oneself. But now I am ^so^ glad to have it from you --
I am glad things are looking better for Mrs Stowe's daughter* -- it is pleasanter for them than outside help however
cordially given, -- But it would have been a pleasure to do something for the children of one who has done so much for us and for the world.
I am sorry to hear of your cold; be very very careful --
Elizabeth C. Agassiz --
Notes
1897: This date is based, somewhat tentatively, upon Agassiz mentioning a recent visit by Madame Blanc and Fields's new book and her mentioning Harriet Beecher Stowe's daughter. See note below.
Madame Blanc: Marie Thérèse de Solms Blanc. See Key to Correspondents.
My dating of this letter to 1897 depends on Agassiz mentioning Harriet Beecher Stowe's daughter. Stowe had two daughters surviving in 1897, Harriet Beecher Stowe (1836-1907) and Eliza Tyler Stowe (1836-1912). There also was a least one daughter-in-law. Which person Agassiz and Fields are discussing is not yet known.
Bringing up Stowe's daughter, however, at least suggests that the book Agassiz is so happy to have received was Fields's The Life and Letters of Harriet Beecher Stowe (1897).
On this soft foundation, I have placed the conclusion that Agassiz speaks of the second visit to the United States of Madame Blanc, which extended from spring until early summer in 1897. Huntington Library archivists also suggest this date.
For American author, Harriet Beecher Stowe, see Key to Correspondents.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Huntington Library, San Marino, CA, James Thomas Fields papers and addenda mssFI 1-5637, Box 1. Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Louisa Loring Dresel
Saturday [ December 26, 1897? ] 1
My dear Loulie
I came back -- with the storm apparently! -- and I found a present on my desk. I didn't know how to play with it at first, but I do now. A. F.* showed me and she laughed and I laughed I thank you very very much I am sorry you are lame
Stoddart's Note
1 The contents of this unfinished, unsigned note seem close to the following letter, perhaps referring to the bird whistle described in that letter, and the note may never have been sent.
Editor's notesA. F. : Annie Fields. See Correspondents.
The manuscript of this letter is in the collection of the Miller Library of Colby College, Waterville, ME. The transcription first appeared in Scott Frederick Stoddart's Ph.D. dissertation at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign: Selected Letters of Sarah Orne Jewett, copyright by Stoddart, 1988. Annotation is by Stoddart, supplemented where appropriate by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Louisa Loring Dresel
Sunday 148 Charles St. [ After December 25, 1897 ]
My dear Loulie.
I thank you so much for your dear Christmas remembrance. I
shall wish to know the story of so beautiful a pin! Where you
got it, and all about it, and I appropriate its box with joy.
And the bird with a beautiful voice!!* I take him to my heart,
and I blow him from time to time and hear an answering chuckle
from Mrs. Fields from far corners of the house. We have enjoyed
his company immensely, also his clerical tie. I think he reminds
me of a certain type of parson on the whole.
Dear Loulie you were very good, and I add your letter of
yesterday to this charming Christmas kit. I am afraid that
I shall not see you this time but I must be coming back soon
again. I am so glad that you like the little book
bowl. I have first just been to
Sarmenter street to see the pictures in the loan collection
there. I think you will like to go some day. I had such nice
talks with some of the people there. an Irishman and an
Italian boy. Which I will tell you about some day. [so
transcribed]
Yours loving S. O. J.
Stoddart's Notes
1 This letter is written on black-bordered
stationary in memory of Caroline Jewett Eastman (died 1 April,
1897). The curators have dated it in pencil.
Editor's Notes
bird with a beautiful voice: It seems
likely that Dresel has given Jewett a "warbling bird whistle,"
which typically required blowing through a small water reservoir
to turn the whistle into a warble. Often then, as now, the
whistle featured a bird figure as part of the structure.
The image below, from Popscreen.com,
is meant to suggest what the gift may have looked like.
Sarmenter street: There is no Sarmenter Street in Boston, but there is a Parmenter Street. On Parmenter Street in 1897 was the North End Union, a social service agency founded by the Benevolent Fraternity of Churches in 1892, which provided social services and education to residents of Boston's North End, including apprenticeships in printing and plumbing. Among the supporters of the Union were Lillian Adrich, Annie Fields, and a good number of their friends. In the late 19th century, the North End of Boston was populated mainly by immigrants, including Italians and Irish. While there may have been occasional exhibits of art on loan held at the Union, no evidence has yet turned up regarding an exhibit there in December 1897
The manuscript of this letter is in the collection of the Miller Library of Colby College, Waterville, ME. The transcription first appeared in Scott Frederick Stoddart's Ph.D. dissertation at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign: Selected Letters of Sarah Orne Jewett, copyright by Stoddart, 1988. Annotation is by Stoddart, supplemented where appropriate by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Marie Thérèse de Solms Blanc to Sarah Orne Jewett
This letter was composed in French; a transcription follows the translation.
Yes, dear Sarah, you will have seen Marquis.* What a charming idea to give me that! My departure for America feels nearer and more real to me. If you only knew how happy it makes me and how much I need it to escape a most difficult and troubling situation.* In this Christmas season, I am charged to convey good wishes to you and Mrs. Fields,*
first from Mme. de Sinéty,* now a grandmother for the fourth time and as young and bright as ever; then from Mme. Foulon de Vaulx,* who is devoting herself to successful translation and has just published, in the Revue de Paris, a translation of the somewhat sensational novel by Hamlin Garland* that I brought back with me from America. Now and for the last three months, that poor woman
Everyone believed she had all sorts of grave illnesses. Isn't that strange? Her son* is on his 5th volume of poetry and is preparing a play for the Théâtre Français.
I would like to tell you about my Lili.* She is as well-behaved as she is beautiful, with such an amusing air, both serious and reserved. She sings rounds on pitch in her little voice and is wild to hear stories, and when I've not told one recently, she comes to lean on my knees with an insistent air: "Hey grandmother!" -- The other day the story was about wolves and apparently I was telling it well, because suddenly she hid her eyes, trembling: "I'm afraid!" -- "Of what, Lili, wolves?" -- "No, I'm afraid of grandmother" --- I will miss her very much when they take her away in a few days.
God bless you and your dear ones. I embrace your sisters, my distance as much as my age allowing such familiarity. And I embrace Theodore* as well.
To all I wish the best. Your pointed firs* delighted me.
Is it Mr Houghton I have to thank for Longfellow's* letters?
Take on the commission for me, I beg you.
yours with all my heart Th Blanc
Notes
1897: Establishing the year of this letter is complicated by an impossibility. The main problem is that nearly all of the internal evidence discussed in the notes below points to it being composed in December of 1897, but three items shed doubt on this information. First, Blanc did not revisit the United States after the summer of 1897. Further, Blanc indicates that she has recently read Jewett's The Country of the Pointed Firs, which was published in the latter half of 1896. And finally, confusion arises from Blanc seemingly giving the nickname of "Lili" to two of her young relatives -- see the note below on Lili.
I have chosen to place this letter in 1897, though one might as easily date it to 1896.
Marquis: This reference is mysterious. Perhaps she refers to an article in Revue des Deux Mondes, for example, "Un Naturalist Français: Le Marquis de Saporta," by Albert Gaudry, which appeared in the 15 January 1896 issue.
situation: To which situation Mme. Blanc refers is not yet known. Perhaps she worries about her son. In a January 1896 letter to Jewett, she laments trouble with Édouard Blanc's marriage. At some later date before Mme. Blanc's death, the couple separated, but more details are not yet known.
Mrs. Fields: Annie Adams Fields. See Key to Correspondents.
Mme. de Sinéty: Madame Alice Marie Léonie Ogier d´Ivry Comtesse de Sinéty (1837-1924), wife of Count Joseph Louis Marie de Sinéty (1837-1915).
Mme. Foulon de Vaulx: In 1872 Alice Devaulx married Henri Foulon (1844-1929). Shortly after they married, they changed their names to "Foulon de Vaulx." Henri Foulon de Vaulx was a Belgian industrialist and historian. Alice Foulon de Vaulx became a translator, notably of works by Hamlin Garland.
If she had completed this translation at the end of 1896, then almost certainly, the title was Garland's A Member of the Third House: A Dramatic Story (1892). Alice Foulon de Vaulx's translation was published in Paris in 1897 as A la Troisième Chambre.
Hamlin Garland: American author, Hamlin Garland (1860-1940).
sopomined coal tar lotions: Such lotions were used at the end of the 19th century to rinse excess oil from one's hair.
her son: Alice Foulon de Vaulx's son was the French poet and novelist, André Foulon de Vaulx (1873-1951). His fifth volume of poems was The Extinct Life (1897). He also published several plays between1895 and 1898.
Lili: See Blanc in Key to Correspondents. As explained in the correspondents entry, the identity of "Lili" is ambiguous. Probably in this letter Blanc refers to the older of the two girls she seems to have called "Lili," her granddaughter Christine (1894-1901).
Theodore: Theodore Jewett Eastman, son of Jewett's younger sister, Caroline Eastman. Jewett's older sister was Mary Rice Jewett. See Key to Correspondents.
Pointed Firs: Jewett's book, The Country of the Pointed Firs (1896) began serialization in Atlantic Monthly in January 1896 and appeared in book form near the end of the year.
Houghton ... Longfellow's letters: American publisher Henry Oscar Houghton died on 25 August 1895 (see Key to Correspondents). Possibly, Blanc refers to his son, Henry Oscar Houghton, Jr. (1856-1906).
There were several published volumes that included letters by American poet, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (see Key to Correspondents). A likely choice for Mme. Blanc would have been Samuel Longfellow's 3-volume biography of his brother: Life of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow: with extracts from journals and correspondence (1886).
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Huntington Library, San Marino, CA, in the James T. Fields Papers and Addenda mss FI 1-5637, Box 5. Transcription, translation and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College, with essential assistance from Jeannine Hammond, Professor of French, Emerita, at Coe College.
Transcription
26 Dbre Paris
Oui, chère Sarah, vous
aurez voir Marquis. Quelle
idée charmante de me donner
cela! Mon départ pour
L'Amérique est devient
comme plus prochain
et plus réel. Si vous
saviez la fête que je
m'en fait et comme
J'ai besoin de cela pour
sortir de la situation
la plus difficile et la
plus angoissée du
monde. -- En ces jours
de Noël je suis chargée
pas plus d'une de
compliments pour
vous et pour "Mrs Fields,
d'abord par Mme de
Sinéty devenue grand'mère
pour la quatrième fois
et aussi jeune, aussi
bright que jamais;
puis par Mme Foulon
de Vaulx qui se livre à
la traduction avec succès
et vient de faire paraître
dans la Revue de Paris
la traduction d'un roman
[ q. q. for quelque ] peu sensationnel
de Hamlin Garland
que J'avais rapporté
avec moi d'Amérique.
La pauvre femme
est en ce moment
et depuis trois mois
étrange accident. Son
visage, aussi rose que
jamais, a démesurément
enflé, au point que
les yeux ont peine à
s'ouvrir et c'est l'effet
des lotions de coaltar sopominé
dont elle usait pour
nettoyer sa magnifique
chevelure. Il paraît
qu'on ne doit jamais
user de cet antiseptique
que très étendu d'eau et
pendant peu de temps
de suite. Elle en a pour
six mois de laideur et
de régime, sans compter
l'inquiétude! On lui
croyait toutes les maladies
les plus graves. N'est-ce pas
curieux? -- Son fils en est
à son 5e volume de vers
et prépare une piéce [ pr for pour par ] le
Théâtre Français. --
Je voudrais [ vs for vous ] montrer
ma Lili. Elle est aussi
sage que belle, avec un
petit air grave et réservé
si amusant. Elle chante
des rondes d'une petite
voix très juste, aime follement
les histoires et quand je suis
[ q. q. for quelque ] temps sans lui en raconter,
vient s'accouder sur mes
genoux d'un air provocant:
"Dis donc grand'mère!" -- L'autre
jour il était question de loups
et il paraît que je racontais
l'histoire in an effective way
car tout à coup elle se cacha
les yeux en tremblant: -- J'ai peur! --
-- De quoi donc, Lili, des loups? --
"Non, J'ai peur de grand'mère ---
Elle me manquera beaucoup
quand on me la reprendra ces jours {.}
Que Dieu vous bénisse vous et
les chères vôtres. J'embrasse vos soeurs
et la distance autant que mon
âge, permettant cette familiarité.
J'embrasse Théodore aussi!
[ Continued from the above, but from half way up the page to the top. ]
A tous je souhaîte [ pr for pour ]
le meilleur! Vos
pointed firs m'ont
ravie.
Est-ce Mr Houghton
que je dois remercier
[ pr for pour ] les lettres de Longfellow?
[ Continued from the above, but up the full length of the page. ]
Chargez-vous de la commission je [vs for vous ] prie.
à [ vs for vous ] de tout coeur Th Blanc
Mary Elizabeth Garrett to Sarah Orne Jewett
Hot Springs
Virginia
December 27th 1897
It was good to see your handwriting again and to get your Xmas greeting with the charming little paperweight which I assure you will do a great deal of wandering about with me -- Thank you so much. I hope Xmas has brought a great deal of brightness to you so that it has been on the whole a happy and not a sad time ---
I came down here to spend the holidays with Miss Thomas,* whose father you may have heard died very suddenly not many weeks ago -- You know how beautiful the valley is and we are enjoying the beauty & the delicious air and the restfulness of it all -- Shall stay here until New Year's Eve -- then, after a few days in Baltimore I expect to go in to what is [ my ? ] -- what shall we call it, headquarters -- pied à terre* -- not home -- this winter my little flat in 10th Street, and there
I want you very much to come & make me a visit -- Can you not plan to do so sometime between January 17th & February 20th ? I want at the least a week or ten days and just as much more as you can give me -- It has been such a very long time since that very little glimpse of you that could hardly be called a visit -- pleasant as it was -- at Islesboro -- and I want to see you very much. I can not ask Mrs. Fields* & you to come together as I
have only one guest room and that by no means a large home but I hope I may be fortunate enough to persuade her to come sometime during the winter. If it should be really impossible for you to come between these dates, we must try to arrange for a later time, but I should be much disappointed not to have you early in the winter.
Please give kindest messages to your sister & remember me warmly to Theodore* if he is at home -- with love for yourself & hoping that I may look forward to seeing you before long,
Mary E. Garrett
Notes
Miss Thomas: American educator and suffragist, Martha Carey Thomas (1857-1935) was the second president of Bryn Mawr College in Pennsylvania. Wikipedia. Her father was a physician, James Carey Thomas (1833- 7 November 1897).
Garrett also makes indirect reference to the loss of Jewett's younger sister, Caroline Jewett Eastman on 1 April 1897.
pied à terre: French. A temporary residence.
Mrs. Fields: Annie Adams Fields. See Key to Correspondents.
sister ... Theodore: Mary Rice Jewett and Theodore Jewett Eastman. See Key to Correspondents.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of Harvard University: Sarah Orne Jewett Correspondence I, Letters to Sarah Orne Jewett.
Garrett, Mary E. 2 letters; 1895-1897. (75).
This transcription is from a photocopy held by the Maine Women Writer's Collection, University of New England, Letters from Sarah Orne Jewett, 1875-1890, Box 2, Folder 99, Burton Trafton Jewett Research Collection.
Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Louise Imogen Guiney to Annie Adams Fields
Dec. 29.
[ 1897 ]*
Dear Mrs. Fields:
Now I know I am a Shining Stoopid to ask such a thing [ possibly an exclamation point ] but could 'New Year's Eve', by any figure of rhetoric, possibly mean Saturday eve? For, you see, I long to come, and unless I may interpret Pick-wickiously,* behold, I can't, my luckless Friday being vowed away, already. Whereby I lament aloud, even with the hope of repeal before me. Besides, I have long desired to meet the Writing Lady, and the Publishing Gentleman!* to say naught of Miss Jewett* and your Grace.
L.I.G.
Notes
1897: This date was assigned by the Huntington Library. The choice is supported by Guiney's noting that 31 December would fall on Friday, as it did in 1897.
Pick-wickiously: Guiney alludes to The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club (1836-7) by British author Charles Dickens (1812-1870). The main character, Samuel Pickwick, and a number of his associates are whimsical and likely to be somewhat cavalier about details such as dates.
Writing Lady ...Publishing Gentleman: These persons have not yet been identified. One guest of Fields at this time in 1897 was Charles Dudley Warner. See Key to Correspondents.
Miss Jewett: Sarah Orne Jewett. See Key to Correspondents.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Huntington Library, San Marino, CA, in the James T. Fields collection Box 26: mss FI 1581. Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Mary Rice Jewett
30 December [1897]*
Dear Mary
You can see your sister is sleepy by beginning this evening letter in the wrong place. “Charlie” has gone off to his Tavern Club dinner to Mr. Seth Low* after having a cup of tay and an hour or two of talk. I am so glad that I am here for poor A. F.* has got a swelled cheek but no toothache fortunately. She looks poorer than ever, but thinks she is better than she was. We went out to walk both of us, this morning and I went downtown with Sullivan beside and saw about Theodores cards which he shall have early in the week -- as soon I hope, as he needs them. I spoke about the mug too which is also promised for early in the week. Do you think we had better have anything put on the bottom the two whole names for instance? beside C. E. G. in a Cipher* on the front? which will make it look much handsomer. I laughed so just now at Becca’s affidavit about the riding in a hack to Salmon Falls. You may say that if I was mortified at the thought of it I am still more mortified at the reality. Nobody else will go down to history as having done it, and I dont care if she did fling proud looks out of the (frosted) window at those who footed it to Salmon Falls that night. I hope she and Lizzie* slewed as they went round the picker.* Do tell me if the great hunting expedition was successful and where it went. I could see it start as well as you when you were writing. Timmy* must have wished he could go, but I am glad that Betty* had so pleasant an opportunity. Mr. Warner* seems very well and in good spirits -- he means to stay until Saturday. Sally Norton* was here this afternoon and they had a little visitation which was a pleasure as he came just as she was going away. Goodnight with much love and be sure you give my messages to Becca. I forgot to ask you what Mrs. Tyler’s address is -- so I have not written but it just occurs to me that I can write to ‘South Berwick Maine! Dont you think the letters have been very nice?
Sarah
Notes1897: This is a tentative date. The notes
below indicate a date before October 1900 when Charles Dudley
Warner died. That Theodore is purchasing printed cards suggests
that he is preparing for his high school graduation in the
spring of 1898. It is not known, however, when the
custom of sending out personally printed graduation
announcements began in the United States.
Charlie ... Tavern Club... Seth Low: Almost
certainly, Charlie is Charles Ashburton Gilman. See Key
to
Correspondents.
Seth Low (1850-1916) was an American
educator and politician who served as President of Columbia
University (1890-1901) and Mayor of Brooklyn (1881-85) and of
New York City (1902-03). He made a fortune in his
father's tea and silk firm. His wife was Anne Wroe
Scollay Curtis of Boston, whose father was U. S. Supreme Court
justice Benjamin R. Curtis.
The "Tavern Club" was a Boston men's eating
club, founded in 1884 on Park Square in Boston. It remains a
venue for dinners and gatherings after Harvard symposia.
A.F.: Annie Adams Fields. See Key to Correspondents.
Sullivan ... Theodores cards: This Sullivan
remains as yet unidentified. Perhaps this person was an
employee of Annie Fields?
Why Theodore Jewett Eastman (see Key
to
Correspondents) is having cards printed is
unknown. Would it be associated in some way with his
activities at Harvard?
C. E. G. in a Cipher on the front: The
occasion of this mug and the persons associated with it remain
unknown. The only Jewett correspondents whose initials
approximate these are Charles Ashurton Gilman and Mary
Elizabeth Garrett.
Becca: Rebecca Young. See Key to Correspondents.
Lizzie: Though it is possible that Jewett refers
to Elizabeth Jervis Gilman, sister of "Charlie," it seems more
likely she refers to a Jewett family employee, Lizzie
Pray. She is mentioned so far only in a letter of 6
October 1898.
went round the picker: Peter Michaud
explains:
Dorthy Green (1909-2002) of Salmon Falls Village in Rollinsford once gave me a brief tutorial on terms of the village, including "going round the picker," which was to follow Front Street around the picker building attached to Mill #2 and on to South Berwick. The term "picker" references the picker machines that are part of the manufacturing process of cotton and wool. Picker machines separated cotton fibers, removed impurities, and prepared cotton for carding. They could create a fire hazard and often were located in a separate building, like the one in Salmon Falls.
Additional research assistance from: Wendy
Pirsig, Norma Keim, Emily Loiselle, and John Demos.
Timmy: Timmy was a Jewett family dog. As of this
writing, he first appears in a letter of 17 November 1894, and
he is reported to be "old" in a letter from late winter of
1903.
Betty: It seems likely that Betty is another dog who
was able to join the mentioned hunt, but her owner is unknown.
Mr. Warner: Charles Dudley Warner, who died in October 1900. See Key to Correspondents.
Sally Norton: Sara Norton. See Key to Correspondents.
Mrs. Tyler: Augusta Maria Denny Tyler. See Key to Correspondents.
This text is from transcriptions from mixed repositories in the Maine Women Writer's Collection, University of New England, Letters from Sarah Orne Jewett, 1875-1890, Folder 74, Burton Trafton Jewett Research Collection. For more information about the individual transcription, contact the Maine Women Writers Collection. Preparation by Linda Heller. Notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Henry Green
Boston 31 December 31
1898
[ 1897 ]*
Dear Elder Henry
I thank you for
your kind letter and kind present of your interesting book. I
was sure that you would all like to read Mrs. Fields's Life of
Mrs. Stowe,* but it is very pleasant to have such
appreciative words and I could not fail to let the author
share them --
I have
hoped to be able to send you a copy of the French review in
which Madame Blanc* gave some reminiscences of our visit to
your Family with some very sympathetic accounts of the Shaker
belief and history. ^She was^ helped by the pamphlets and*
especially by the information which you and Eldress Harriet{,}
Eldress Lucinda and others were so kind to give her, and
speaks very warmly of
her experiences. Of course a foreigner may make mistakes
easily -- and often uses a word in quite another sense from
our sense of it, but I am sure that you will find much to
enjoy --
I thought that I could get some
spare copies easily (I borrowed the copy which I read) but it
seems that the review is only sent to its [ regular corrected
] subscribers in America -- I have sent to France for one for
you which is likely to be here sometime
next month. If you are near one of the large libraries you
will find the paper in the Revue des Deux Mondes for
Octr 15th {--} I think
that it would be interesting to have some passages at least,
translated and reprinted in one of your magazines. Madame
Blanc writes me that she has had a great many letters about
the paper & that it has seemed to interest many readers in
France. She knows that I always see a friend's copy and I
suppose thinks that we could easily get
other copies here, or she would have sent over one. You will
understand how her account of our visit made me live it over
again, but, I have always remembered it with great pleasure.
Please remember me most affectionately to all my kind friends. I hope indeed to come again as you kindly invite me, with my sister. *
Yours most sincerely,
S. O. Jewett
Notes
1897: Cary speculates that Jewett accidentally
wrote the wrong date. It does appear that she has written an
"8," even though, as the notes below indicate, she almost
certainly wrote this letter in December 1897.
Madame Blanc: Marie Thérèse de Solms Blanc. Key
to Correspondents.
Blanc visited the Alfred, ME, Shaker Colony
in 1897. Her account of this visit, "Le Communisme en
Amérique," appeared in Revue des Deux Mondes, November
15,
1897.
Stowe: Annie Adams Fields and Harriet Beecher
Stowe. Key to Correspondents. Fields's book
appeared, according to Richard Cary, in November 1897.
and: Sometimes Jewett writes "a" with a long tail for "and." I render these as "and."
Eldress Harriet ... Eldress Lucinda: In photographs of
residents at the Alfred Maine Shaker village in the 1890s, at
Maine History Online, appear Eldress Harriet Goodwin
(1823-1903) and Eldress Harriett Newell Coolbroth
(1864-1953). It is not clear to which woman Jewett
refers. On Coolbroth see Historical Dictionary of
the Shakers (2008), by Stephen J. Paterwic, pp. 48-9.
Among the Alfred Shakers was Lucinda
Taylor.
sister: Mary Rice Jewett.
New transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Annie Adams Fields to Katharine McMahon Johnson
Decr 31st 1897
Dear Mrs. Johnson:
Your kindest and best of letters and the Christmas card -- and above all Mr. Johnson's book,* came in the happy moment of good wishes and good will. Thank you indeed, both,
We have had colds here, mine being an exhausting and lingering variety, but I am beginning to be quite
myself again and Mifs Jewett* is throwing off her attack bravely also. I consider hers a Christmas cold! so much may be laid to the fatigues of the Christmas season.
Indeed, indeed, how much you must miss your little girl!* I trust you like the school where you have left her, (like its influences, I mean) and that it is a [ school corrected ] that our dear Madame
Blanc* knew and approved, for I consider her judgment [ about corrected ] such questions in France of the highest value.
I shall be very glad to hear about your summer in France when we have the good fortune to meet.
With renewed thanks to Mr. Johnson and for your loving letter
yours most truly
A blessed New Year to your house!
Notes
book: Robert Underwood Johnson's 1897 book was Songs of Liberty and Other Poems.
girl: The Johnsons's daughter was Agnes McMahon Johnson Holden (1880-1968).
Jewett: Sarah Orne Jewett. See Key to Correspondents.
Blanc: Marie Thérèse de Solms Blanc. See Key to Correspondents.
This manuscript is held by the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, University of Texas at Austin. MS Johnson, RU Recip. Fields, Annie, 7 ALS, 1 APCS to Robert Underwood Johnson. Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Annie Adams Fields
Tuesday evening. [1897]*
Dear, -- Oh, I did have such a good
time today! I went to see some huge pine trees down in the edge
of Wells, -- an out-of-the-way road, but I always knew that
these pines were the biggest in the state and had a great desire
to see them. Oh, do go next summer to see the most superb
creatures that ever grew! I don't believe that their like is in
New England. More than four feet through their great trunks, and
standing so tall that their great green tops seem to belong to
the next world. In all my life I never was in such glorious
woods. I long to take you there. Afterward I went into the
farmhouse and had a perfectly beautiful time. I knew they were
old patients of father's, and that he used to like to go there,
but I was not prepared to find Doris and Dan Lester* a dozen
years older than when we met them last!!! And they had read
works of Pinny and were so affectionate and delightful and
talked about father -- and made a little feast for she, and it
was a perfectly beautiful good time.
Notes
1897: If one takes literally Jewett's statement that it has been a dozen years since last meeting Doris and Dan Lester, then the date of this letter would be 1897.Doris and Dan Lester: These are characters from Jewett's A Marsh Island (1885).
This letter appears in Annie Fields, Letters of Sarah Orne Jewett (1911), Transcribed by Annie Adams Fields, with notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Sarah Orne Jewett to Annie Adams Fields
[ 1897 ]
Dear darling Fuff --*
. . . . . . . . . . . . .
Last
night
I
had
a
perfect
delight
re-reading
Dorothy Wordsworth's Tom [Tour ?] in Scotland.* I
finished it by hurrying a little at the end, but there is no
more charming book in the world. It is just our
book & the way we enjoy things isn't it, when we are fooling
it out of doors . . . . . . . . . .
Notes
1897: This tentative date is based upon Jewett's
reference to the Journals of Dorothy Wordsworth, which appeared
in book form in 1897. Given Jewett's interest in the
Wordsworths, it is likely that she read Dorothy's journals as
soon as they became available and that she reread parts she
particularly liked soon after.
The ellipses in the transcription indicate
that this is a selection from the manuscript.
Fuff: Nickname for Annie Adams Fields. See Key to Correspondents.
Dorothy Wordsworth's Tom in Scotland:
This seems likely to be an error in transcription. Dorothy Wordsworth (1771-1855), the sister
of the British Romantic poet, William Wordsworth (1770-1850), includes
in her journals, a chapter on "A Tour Made in Scotland (A. D.
1803)." Her journals began to appear in book form in 1897.
Pinny: Nickname for Sarah Orne Jewett. See Key to Correspondents.
This text is from transcriptions from mixed repositories in the Maine Women Writer's Collection, University of New England, Letters from Sarah Orne Jewett, 1875-1890, Folder 72, Burton Trafton Jewett Research Collection. For more information about the individual transcription, contact the Maine Women Writers Collection. Preparation by Linda Heller. Notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.Edited by Terry Heller, Coe College.
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