Annie Adams Fields to Isabella Stewart Gardner
148 Charles St. [Boston]
May Sixth -- [ 1910 ]*
Dear Mrs Gardner;
Dear Isabella;
(as I find myself calling you all to myself!)
There never were such roses, and never a
lovelier day for them to come -- a solitary and ^by turns^
sunshiny Sunday -- when a friend's remembrance means so much --
Speaking of the roses -- once a famous singer
was told that it was
[ Page 2 ]
one sign of genius to be able to do anything perfectly well --
the perfection of her song was so [ insurmountable
corrected
]; --
that was genius.
Let us apply that among many other of your
attainments to flower growing --
These roses were the perfection of
their kind -- and the kind a glory in itself --
I am glad you are soon to be at Green Hill*
and perhaps will come to
[ Page 3 ]
Manchester in the course of the summer for a night under my roof
--
Miss Cochrane* is coming to me for the season
and I shall [ hope
corrected ] for music. I am busy now
preparing a book of letters of my dear Sarah. I hope all her
friends will send me any which they may have preserved. I do not
mean to make a large or a tiresome book, -- one only large
enough to show her qualities of mind and heart.
Affectionately yours
Annie Fields.
Notes
1910: As Fields indicates in this letter, she began
preparing an edition of Sarah Orne Jewett letters during the
year following Jewett's death on 24 June 1909.
Though it seems almost certain that Fields
wrote this letter in 1910, the date is somewhat
problematic. May 6th fell on a Friday in 1910; Fields
seems to be writing on the day she received the roses, but
either she has miss-dated her letter or she has
uncharacteristically waited several days before sending her
thanks. Perhaps she meant to write May 8?
Green Hill: Gardner's summer home in Brookline, MA.
Miss Cochrane: Jessie Cochrane. See
Correspondents.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Fenway Museum,
Papers of Isabella Stewart Gardner, Fields, Annie (Adams) (Mrs
James T. Fields) 1882, 3 M letters, n.d., 1909, and letter from
Mary S. Savell [Mary E. Garrett] to Annie Fields, 1903. 1915.
In her manuscripts, Fields often uses "=" for
a hyphen and "Mifs" for "Miss" when naming women. I have
regularized these usages.
New transcription and annotation by Terry
Heller, Coe College.
Selected from Robert Collyer to Annie Adams Fields
[ 16 May 1910
201 West 55th St. New York City ]
You are well I will believe and busy I know,
setting the letters in order, not from the dead hand but the
living
of our dear friend* and making true the scripture "she being
dead yet speaketh{.}"*
Notes
friend.: Sarah Orne Jewett. See
Key to Correspondents.
speaketh: From the Bible, Hebrews 11:4.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Huntington Library,
San Marino, CA, in the James T. Fields Papers and Addenda Box
11: mss FI 1-5637. Transcription and notes by Terry
Heller, Coe College.
Selection from Annie Adams Fields to George Edward Woodberry
June 12
th 1910
[ Begin letterhead ]
MANCHESTER BY-THE-SEA,
MASSACHUSETTS.
[ End letterhead ]
[ Page 2 ]
But we are not talking of dying but of living to the full, and
pouring a large cup that others may drink and intoxicated rise
to a higher level than is [ common
? ] [ to
or for
? ] the world of men!
"Bring me wine but wine that
In the belly of the grape never grew"*
[ Page 3 ]
Meanwhile I am going on with the congenial easy service of
putting the little book of ^ S.O.J.'s^ Letters* together,
among which yours take such a foremost place, I have made a
brief introduction to my own letters with which the little
volume will end -- because it appeared to be needed to round the
whole into form. I hope you will like the whole and will not say
as Emerson* did after he had carefully eliminated from Thoreau's
verse ^all^ which did not, to him, seem [
deletion ]
quite inevitable, and sent the rest to his sister at her
request; I fear
[ Page 4 ]
"she will spoil my Greek Statue":* as indeed she did replacing
everything in her [
unrecognized word ] and more.
No, I have endeavored to cut [
unrecognized word --
profitably
? ] for
her ^Sarah's^ keen
taste and judgment,
without cutting out the dear human
natural element which was a distinguishing quality or her
honesty.
Notes
letters: Fields
Letters of Sarah Orne Jewett
appeared in 1911.
grew: American poet and philosopher, Ralph Waldo
Emerson (1803-1882) wrote "Bacchus," which opens:
Bring me wine, but wine which never grew
In the belly of the grape,
Statue: In her chapter "Glimpses of Emerson," in
Authors
and Friends (1896), Fields recounts the story of Emerson's
role in publishing the poems of American author Henry David
Thoreau (1817-1862). See also Wikipedia.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library of
Harvard University: George Edward Woodberry correspondence and
compositions I. Letters to George Edward Woodberry,
Fields, Annie (Adams) 1834-1915. 65 letters; 1889-1914.,
1889-1914. Box: 2, MS Am 1587, (71)
This transcription is from a photocopy held
by the Maine Women Writers Collection, Burton Trafton
Collection, Box 2, folder 87.
Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe
College.
Mary Amelia St. Clair to Annie Adams Fields
4- Edwardes Sq. Studios
London. [ W ? ]
Aug 3. 1910
My dear M
rs Fields
How very sweet of you to send me that lovely
coral pin. I am sure it is not only a pin, but a charm; so no
evil eye can [ "overlook"
? ] me when I have it on.
I am so glad to get my dear Protheros* back
[ Page 2 ]
again & to hear news of you from them. I like to think of
them, going as I went, one happy day, to see you in your
beautiful room. Always it stands out as the happiest & most
living thing that happened to me in America. I loved you
from the minute when you asked me (
you won't remember,
but
I do!) to give you my arm when you went across the
room; & I can feel yours now, as it
[ Page 3 ]
touched ^mine^ -- very light & very gentle. Somehow I
knew that you w
d n't have taken my arm you had n't liked
me a little.
I am looking forward now to living with you
again in your book.* I have not been able to read very much all
the year when I was writing
my book.* I am so glad to
have said good bye to all the horrible interminable proofs. They
made me hate it, poor thing.
I saw the nice Herfords*
[ Page 4 ]
the other day at Hampstead & we spoke of you.
I think it is since I last wrote you that I
went abroad & saw The Riviera, & Rome & Florence
& Venice for the
first time. Unfortunately I c
d
n't stay long enough to know them well; though long enough to
remember it all as long as I live!
Now, most of my holidaying is over & I
hope to get through a good deal of work in the autumn &
winter.
With love & many, many thanks for y
r
beautiful gift
always dear Mrs Fields
v. affectionately ys May Sinclair
Notes
Protheros:
Sir George Walter Prothero (1848 - 1922)
was an English historian. His wife was Mary Butcher. In
1910,
Prothero gave the Lowell Lectures in
Boston and was Schouler Lecturer at Johns Hopkins University.
your book: Sinclair presumably is anticipating Fields's
Letters of Sarah Orne Jewett (1911).
my book: Sinclair's
The
Creators (1910),
the nice Herfords: Among Fields's Hampstead
acquaintances was
Reverend Brooke Herford (1830-1903), a
British Unitarian minister and author, who immigrated to the
United States, serving in Boston after 1881. In 1892, he
returned to England to serve at the Rosslyn Hill Chapel in
Hampstead. As Rev. Herford was deceased in 1910, if
Sinclair refers to these Herfords, she must have met other
members of the family.
"Herford's eldest daughter Helen Brooke (1854-1935) was the
main founder of the national Unitarian Women‘s League in
Britain in 1908."
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Huntington
Library, San Marino, California: James Thomas Fields Papers
and Addenda (1767-1914), Letters of Sinclair, mss FL 1-5637.
May Sinclair, when she abbreviates a word
as well as with some titles places some of the letters in
superscript position. I have elected not to duplicate
this practice in the transcriptions of her letters.
Mary Augusta (Mrs. Humphry) Ward to Annie Adams Fields
Stocks
Aug 27 [ 1910 ]*
My dear M
rs Fields
Dorothy I know is sending you some extracts
from the very few letters alas! that we have been able to find
from dear Sarah* -- It is possible there may be more, but the
accumulation of letters in this house is bewildering, and it
takes a very long time to search -- I am so glad you are
preparing a record of her, dear & noble being! -- And how
are you dear friend -- and has it been a good & restful
summer with you? Here, eventwise, we came back from Italy in
May. I have been hard pressed with many -- too many! kinds of
work, for my illness in the spring threw me back 3 months in
the literary undertakings I have pledged myself to,
[ Page 2 ]
and I have been rather painfully trying to overtake the lost
weeks, to a [
unrecognized word ] accompaniment of
Play centres & vacation Schools, & this endless
suffrage controversy which has as you will know, reached
lately a very critical and exciting shape ^with us^. However
at last the Vacation Schools are over, & the Play-centres
are not yet reopened, & with every day to spend on the
book life seems a little more peaceful. It is to be a
kind of second
Robert Elsmere,* 20 years after! -- and
I do hope
you may be interested in it. But what the
public of M
cClure's Magazine will say to it I
cannot tell -- for it will be
very English,
very
theological and America does not yet seem to have
forgiven me
Daphne. But it gives me joy to get back to
some of the old lines, with a big canvas, & plenty of
space. And now, dear M
rs Fields, here comes
the [ post
? ] -- & this must just carry my love
&
[
Cross-written in the top margin of
page 1 ]
tender remembrance to you. It has been a
weary summer -- endless wind & rain & storms --
But still the flowers bloom, and the new-built Stocks
looks often very pretty. I wish you could see it!
ever your affecte
Mary A Ward
Notes
1910: The Huntington Library has tentatively
given the letter this date. This supposition is
supported by Ward reporting that she and her daughter,
Dorothy, plan to send along soon extracts from Sarah Orne
Jewett letters in their possession, for Fields to consider for
her
Letters of Sarah Orne Jewett (1911).
1910 was a year of considerable activity
related to woman suffrage in England, including protests,
civil disobedience, jailing and force-feeding of protesters.
Central to this activity was a bill in parliament that could
have extended voting to some women. A major event on 18
November came to be called
Black Friday, when suffrage protest
marchers at the Houses of Parliament were violently assaulted
by police and bystanders.
Sarah: Sarah Orne Jewett. See
Key to Correspondents.
Elsmere: Ward's
Robert Elsmere
(1888). Her
Daphne appeared in 1909. Her next
novel (1909-10) was
Canadian Born in UK,
Lady
Merton, Colonist in the US. However, it was not
serialized in
McClure's but in
Ladies Home Journal.
The book she intended as a sequel to
Robert Elsmere
was
The Case of Richard Meynell, serialized January -
December 1911 in
McClure's.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Huntington
Library, San Marino, CA, in the James T. Fields Papers and
Addenda: mss FI 5637, Box 64, Ward, Mary Augusta (Arnold), 14
pieces. Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Selection from Annie Adams Fields to Louise Imogen Guiney
148 Charles Street Boston
March 5th 1911 --
My very dear Louise:
[ Page 4 ]
I am about to print a group of dear Sarah's letters,* half
repentant that I ever undertook the task and Mr. James* still
hopes he will soon be well enough to write the brief
introduction he has long had in mind. They will be published
this summer, according to our plans.
[ Page 5 ]
It seems to me on the whole pretty sad
work this printing of letters! And yet what a joy letters
[ have
corrected ] been to the world! But they do
require a vast deal before and after and undertaking! of
acquirement, of [ fulfilment
so spelled ] of
native character, of wit and wisdom, of unselfishness or
devotion -- all this to make them useful and to be desired
by the human race. Else as the Bible says "they spew them
out of the mouth."* Willa Cather,* the dear child
goes [ on
corrected ], her
[ Page 6 ]
health is much better. The editor=ship* of that fearful
magazine factory will prevent her from her own career as a
writer -- but I trust she will make up her mind to that
and will not struggle, because in that case both will come
to wreck. She has real talent and a noble constitution
naturally but her labors must be gigantic while she holds
the rudder of that vast machine. She would gladly
relinquish it but she must move
[ Page 7 ]
carefully for she carries family responsibilities beside
those of her own....
Notes
Sarah: Sarah Orne Jewett. See Key to
Correspondents. Fields's Letters of Sarah Orne Jewett
appeared in 1911.
Mr. James: Henry James. See Key to
Correspondents.
the mouth: See the Bible, Revelation 3:16.
Willa Cather: See Key to Correspondents. At the
time of this letter, Cather was editor at
McClure's
Magazine.
editor=ship: Fields sometimes uses a doubled
hyphen.
This manuscript is held by the Dinand Library of Holy
Cross College in Box: SC007-GUIN-002, Folder 28.
Transcription and revised notes by Terry
Heller, Coe College.
Selected from Robert Collyer to Annie Adams Fields
[ 1 October 1911
201 West 55th St. New York City ]
Dear Friend for keeps
The Book* came safe and sound and I am head
on and heart on to page 85 at bed time last evening -- with my
pencil in my hand, and only wish your Introduction was longer
-- The story so far is a new revelation of her life to me, and
will be to the end{.} Tender to tears now and then or wreathed
in smiles to which I answer unbeknowing as like as not -- only
you could have made the selection as it stands and if she
could speak from the heavens she would thank you, but her host
of friends and yours will thank you as I do....
Yours always as ever
Robert Collyer
:
Letters of Sarah Orne Jewett (1911)
by Annie Adams Fields.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Huntington
Library, San Marino, CA, in the James T. Fields Papers and
Addenda Box 11: mss FI 1-5637. Transcription and notes
by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Annie Adams Fields to Mr Updike
Octr 10th
1911
[ Begin letterhead ]
MANCHESTER BY-THE-SEA,
MASSACHUSETTS.
[ End letterhead ]
My dear Mr. Updike:*
Your note is a pleasure
to me for which I must thank you before the next mail goes
out.
Yes! they are (the Letters)* more full of
the writer than letters often are! Why one can scarcely say;
but I am glad you have found her again in them. I shall
come to town shortly now and shall hope to see you.
Most truly yours
Annie Fields
Notes
Updike: Almost certainly Mr. Updike is
Daniel Berkeley Updike (1860-1941) an
American printer and typography historian who began his career
at Houghton, Mifflin & Co. in 1880 before going on to
found Merrymount Press in 1896.
Letters: Annie Fields's edition of
Letters of
Sarah Orne Jewett (1911).
The manuscript of this letter is held by Milne Special
Collections and Archives, University of New Hampshire Library,
Durham, NH, USA: Annie Fields Letters, 1882-1911, MS 58.
Transcription and notes by Terry Heller,
Coe College.
Selected from Mary Augusta (Mrs. Humphry) Ward to Annie
Adams Fields
[ 27 October 1911
From Stocks, Tring, UK.
The charming book has arrived, and Dorothy*
and I have been browsing in it in the intervals of this
rushing week which has seen the coming out of
Richard
Meynell and when the days seem to have been one
continuous whirl of letters and [ services
? ]. But I
have read enough to see how truly & purely these letters
reflect the schõne seele* that dear Sarah* was, & how
tactfully & wisely you have put them together. When life
is a little less [ humid
? ] -- next week -- I will
write again dear friend, much more at length. How [
deleted
word ] beautiful is the frontispiece!*
Notes
Dorothy: Ward's daughter, Dorothy Ward. See
Ward in
Key to Correspondents.
Meynell: Ward's
The Case of Richard Meynell
(1911).
schõne seele: German,
beautiful soul.
Sarah: Sarah Orne Jewett. See
Key to Correspondents. Ward and her
daughter were reading Fields's
Letters of Sarah Orne
Jewett (1911).
frontispiece: The frontispiece of
Letters of Sarah
Orne Jewett is a photograph of the youthful Jewett.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Huntington
Library, San Marino, CA, in the James T. Fields Papers and
Addenda: mss FI 5637, Box 64, Ward, Mary Augusta (Arnold), 14
pieces. Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Selected from Robert Collyer to Annie Adams Fields
[ 25 November 1911
201 West 55th St. New York City ]
Dear Friend
Reading your letters* again and then some more{.} I want to
come to sit in
that corner where the books are and
talk to my hearts content -- I sent you The Dial yesterday --
not knowing [wether
so spelled ] you "took it in" as
they say in England -- I think the notice of "The Letters" is
real sweet and good, also delicate -- I read a few at a time
as we used to suck on taffies when we were weans* -- leastwise
I did when I had some -- The dear friend seems to be saying
the things now and then and is not far away, and then silence
as I sit here musing and listening -- just as I think you
do....
Notes
letters:
Letters of Sarah Orne Jewett (1911)
by Annie Adams Fields.
Dial:
A review of
Letters of Sarah Orne
Jewett appeared in
The Dial 15:1 (November
1911), pp. 337-9. Collyer may refer especially to these
sentences:
In
passages like this, the reader finds reflections of the love
of nature and mankind, the poise and resourcefulness and the
bravery and faith of Miss Jewett as woman and author.
Although her health was often poor, she never intruded a
complaint, and her letters, like her stories, are always
hopeful and refreshing.
weans: Wee ones.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Huntington
Library, San Marino, CA, in the James T. Fields Papers and
Addenda Box 11: mss FI 1-5637. Transcription and notes
by Terry Heller, Coe College.
William Dean Howells to Mary Rice Jewett
York Harbor, Sept. 14, 1919.
Dear Miss Jewett:
Yesterday there came a box of your
dear sister's and my dear friend's books, which I suppose came
from you. At any rate I thank you for it with a heart warm
with reading in it in many places. Just now I was reading to
my daughter about that circus, and the lecture to young men,*
and we were between laughing and crying. What beautiful work
everywhere. Nobody has ever come near it.
I hope you will like my choosing for
my American Stories, that delicious sketch The Courting of
Sister Wisby.* It has been hard to choose, and as a story this
is slighter than some others, but the study of the supposed
teller of it is all but incomparable in that dearest and
sweetest old mullein gatherer.
Sometime when you have time and can
copy my letter to your sister* suggesting the kind of work she
should best do for the Atlantic, I should be very grateful for
it.
My daughter joins me in love. It was
such a pleasure to see you.
Yours sincerely,
W. D. Howells.
P. S. I shall have my say about your
sister in my introduction to the book of stories.*
Notes
young men: Howells refers to Jewett's
Deephaven
(1877).
Wisby: Jewett's "The Courting of Sister Wisby" appeared
in
Atlantic Monthly in May 1887 and was collected in
The King of Folly Island (1888).
letter to your sister: It seems likely that Howells
wrote the letter he mentions in 1875-76, but it has not yet
been identified and located.
book of stories: Mildred Howells included the following
note with this letter.
In
The Great Modern American Short Stories (1920),
Howells says:
The three great artists, working
always in simple and native stuff, whom I have almost
inevitably grouped together in the order of my acquaintance
with their stories, are collectively, if not severally,
without equal among their contemporaries in their order of
fiction. I like the beautiful art, the gentle
nature-love and the delicate humor of Sarah Orne Jewett
because I knew it first as the very junior editor whom it
first came to in settled form, but I do not know that I value
it more than the stories of Mrs. Wilkins Freeman or the
stories of Miss Alice Brown, which I knew with the rest of the
public when they began to appear in response to other
editorial welcome. I think The Revolt of “Mother” had
the widest and warmest welcome from the whole English-reading
world; Miss Brown’s story here is fairly suggestive of her
far-reaching study of New England life; and very possibly it
is because of my earlier liking for Sarah Orne Jewett’s story
that I like it most [“The Courting of Sister Wisby”].
She is less dramatic in the piece chosen than the others; the
story is scarcely more than a placid and whimsical study of
scene and character; it was hard to find any story of hers
that was more than a study, but how preciously richer than a
story this study is!
The manuscript of the letter is held by the Houghton Library
of Harvard University. Howells, William Dean, 1837-1920. 16
letters to Sarah Orne Jewett; 1875-1908. Sarah Orne Jewett
correspondence, 1861-1930. MS Am 1743 (105). Transcription and
notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Another transcription appears in
Life in
Letters of William Dean Howells, v. 2, edited by Mildred
Howells.
New York: Doubleday, 1928.
Annie Adams Fields to Katharine and Louisa Loring
[
Upper left corner printed in pencil in another hand:
Annie Fields]
Christmas=tide*
148 Charles St.
Boston
[Penciled in another hand: 1910.]*
Dear friends:
Here comes a Christmas box for two who are still in the woods or
by the sea! but quite unforgotten! The box contains gauds
alas! but may they be welcome gauds -- one a pretty hat pin for
Louisa which Sarah chose for me one day saying: "There dear, you
will like that for a present some day, it is so pretty!
And the other a little string of venetian beads which [holds
?]
an ornament beautifully -- this is for Katherine
[ Page 2 ]
(Louisa, don't you touch it, except you may borrow it to wear
some day if you are very good!) It is so light that you
never think of it and yet it will hold a jewel in place round
the neck quite beautifully -- This is for Katherine!
and all for love and Christmas Day
from
Annie Fields
Notes
Christmas=tide: Fields writes her hyphen
here to appear as an equal sign. She did this quite
often. See for example her
Diary
of
a West Indian Island Tour.
1910: This letter offers no helpful clues
about its date, except for this date penciled in apparently by a
curator. One reason for doubting it is that there is no mention
of Sarah Orne Jewett. This would not necessarily be odd
were the letter from before 1910, for Jewett would also have
written the Loring sisters. Likewise, were the letter from
a later year, before Fields's death in January 1915, Fields
might not mention her missing companion. But it seems odd
that Jewett is not mentioned the 2nd Christmas after her
death. Still, in the absence of more definite information,
the 1910 date has been retained.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Beverly MA
Historical Society in the Loring Family Papers (1833-1943), MSS:
#002, Series II, Letters to Louisa Putnam Loring
(1854-1924) Box 1 Folder 10
. Transcription and
notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.
Robert Collyer to Mary Rice Jewett
[ Begin letterhead ]
201 W
WEST 55TH STREET
NEW YORK
[ End letterhead ]*
October 24th 1911
Dear our Mary
Glad I am to [ recieve
so spelled ]
your letter, and know you are all right and had a pleasant
outing --
May you have a pleasant [ driving
?]
now all the winter long and the rest of the fall at home and the
meet'n as I believe you will for "it is your [ nater
so
spelled ] to{.}" And to tell you we are fairly well at
201, Gertrude has her head aches, but not heart aches to speak
of for which I am glad { -- } so is son Robert{.} We are about
settled except for "Tommy" who died in extreme old age in the
spring to our sorrow for he was the best of good company --
Gertrude is going to find another and then
the home nest will be full{.} I am reading the dear good
[ Page 2 ]
volume with heart whole delight{.} Have got to p. 85 last
evening and save it for quiet hours -- It is well done and well
ordered. I write here and there the sentences met with a pen but
on my heart and there they will stay{.} Maybe I shall return to
this now and again -- I hold a pencil with the other hand and
mark down golden words -- Our dear friends preface is as good as
gold only I wish there was more{.} Today I am going to the
opening of the new Chapin Home on Long Island and have to "make
a few remarks{.} Robert & Gertrude are going on the water to
Long Branch just for the jaunt and the dinner at a small Hotel
they haunt{.}
This is a sad medley but I will do better
some day and am
As ever yours
Robert Collyer
Notes
Gertrude ... Robert: Daughter-in-law and son. See
Key to Correspondents.
dear volume:
Letters of Sarah Orne Jewett (1911)
edited by Annie Adams Fields, "our friend."
Chapin Home: The Chapin Home for the Active Aging was
founded by Hannah Chapin and her husband, American preacher and
editor, Dr. Edwin Hubbell Chapin in 1869. Wikipedia.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library,
Harvard University, Cambridge. Jewett, Sarah Orne, 1849-1909.
Sarah Orne Jewett additional correspondence 1868-1930. IV:
Letters to Mary Rice Jewett, MS Am 1743.1 (237).
V. W. L.* to Annie Adams Fields
Salisbury, Conn.
August 13
th 1914.
Dear Mrs. Fields,
I seldom take up the volume of Miss
Jewett's Letters,* edited by you -- and it is my constant
companion -- without feeling a wish to thank you for the
great pleasure and comfort you are giving those who love
her, in this precious book. At this late hour I obey the
impulse, feeling that I need not
[ Page 2 ]
apologize to you for doing so.
It was never my privilege to meet Miss
Jewett -- in the flesh -- yet so much of her own personality
entered into her stories, that I felt -- in a way -- that I
knew her. She says in one of her letters xxx "it is
those unwritable things that the story holds in its heart --
if it has any -- that makes the true soul of it -- and these
must be understood" .xxx well -- I think that I
understood.
The "heart of the story,"
[ Page 3 ]
which seemed
her heart touched mine,
and found response there. When she passed away I felt a
sense of loss as if something had gone from my life that
could not be replaced. But in these letters you have brought
her back -- nearer than ever before -- for in them we seem
to have her
very self.
I cannot find words to express the
comfort, the joy, the companionship, and true refreshment of
spirit they have brought to me,
[ Page 4 ]
but I think you will "read between the lines", and "
understand,"
my
wish to tell you, tho' very imperfectly, of my gratitude -- for
your invaluable gift to
a lover of
Sarah Orne Jewett,
and yours very sincerely. ( V. W. [ L. ?]
Notes
V. W. L.: The transcription of these initials is
uncertain. The person's identity remains unknown.
Letters: Fields's collection,
Letters of Sarah
Orne Jewett, appeared in 1911.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Massachusetts
Historical Society in Annie Fields papers, 1847-1912, MS.
N-1221, "Loose Letters, 1852-1916." This transcription is from a
microfilm, available courtesy of the University of Kansas
Libraries, Lawrence Kansas: Annie Adams Fields Papers
1852-1912. Folio PS 1669.F5 Z462 1986, Reel 3.
Louise Imogen Guiney to A. K. Gibson* [ selection ]
1 July 1915
No, dear Sarah Jewett,
whom I knew well, was never anything but a pro-Catholic. She
had a natural love for the Faith, and was particularly
attracted, as some of her stories* show, to the character of
the Catholic Irish, the simple devout peasant stock.
She spent almost a year once among them at Bantry Bay.*
: Probably, this is
Archibald Kasson Gibson (1871-1953) of
Grand Rapids, Michigan. The Grand Valley State University
Archives (Allendale, MI) holds his
scrapbook from 1896-1906 that contains
among other items, his correspondence with publishers and
booksellers. A biographical sketch reads: "Archibald K. Gibson
was born in July 1871. He worked as a clerk/teller at the Grand
Rapids National Bank. Gibson was a member of the Society of the
Philistines, an association of book lovers."
Jewett joined the Society of the Philistines
at East Aurora, NY in July 1896. See her letter to the
Society of 9 July 1896.
stories: Jewett published 8 stories about Irish
characters, mainly immigrants to New England. See Morgan,
Jack and Louis A. Renza. ed.
The Irish Stories of Sarah Orne
Jewett. Carbondale: Southern Illinois UP, 1996.
Bantry Bay: It is not correct that Jewett spent any
length of time residing in Ireland.
This passage appears in
Letters of Louise Imogen Guiney v.
2 (1896) pp. 206-7.
Edith Prescott Wolcott to Mary Rice Jewett
Monday [ December 1917 ]*
Dear Mifs Jewett,
It is always a deep pleasure to have a place
in your thoughts, and Christmas brought me this assurance. Many
many thanks, & all bright & good things in the coming
year.
Affectionately yours
Edith Prescott Wolcott
Notes
December 1917: The Houghton Library includes this
letter in a collection of letters to Mary Rice Jewett and
provides the year. The rationale for this information is
not known.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library,
Harvard University, Cambridge, MA. (Wolcott) E. S. W. 1
letter; 1917. Jewett, Sarah Orne, 1849-1909. Sarah Orne Jewett
additional correspondence 1868-1930. IV: Letters to Mary Rice
Jewett, MS Am 1743.1 (242). Note that this catalog entry
seems to have mistaken Wolcott's middle initial.
Josie Dexter to Mary Rice Jewett
Mar 23 [ rd ? ]
[ Begin letterhead ]
393 COMMONWEALTH AVENUE
[ End letterhead ]*
[ 1916 ]*
My dear Mary --
I returned from New York two days ago-- and
found this dear little book of Sarah's verse -- How charming it
is -- Everything is dear -- but the tribute to her Father --
especially appealed to me -- "What heart so loving -- as the
heart that waits" -- there's a whole world of loving
[ Page 2 ]
in those few words --
I am so pleased to have the book -- The little dear Stories --
do bring out dear Sarah's delightful humor -- like nobody else
--
Theodore* was here yesterday{.} I cam home from New York -- with
a bad cold & so sent for him -- He is such a dear --- "a
whole [ train
?] -- and a red dog under the wagon{.}"*
It seems years since I have seen you -- and I have not heard
from
[ Page 3 ]
Emily* since I came home --
Do you hear from Jessie Cochrane?* I never do -- Did she [ ever
? ] get her Fields gifts? Much love to you --
very affectionately
Josie Dexter
Kath-a-rine* is very well -- & up to her eyes in work --
Notes
1916: The year in which Jewett's
Verses
was published.
letterhead: Stamped in the upper left corner of
page 1: TELEPHONE BACK BAY 222.
Theodore: Dr. Theodore Jewett. Key to Correspondents.
wagon: Perhaps an allusion to a popular poem, "The Little
Dog Under the Wagon." See
The Scrap-book: It Being a
Thousand Gems of Prose and Poetry, by Edward Louis Colen
Ward · 1899 (p. 56).
Emily: This person has not yet been identified.
Possibly she is Emily Davis Tyson. Key to Correspondents.
Jessie Cochrane: Key to Correspondents.
Kath-a-rine: This person has not yet been identified.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library,
Harvard University, Cambridge. Jewett, Sarah Orne, 1849-1909.
Sarah Orne Jewett additional correspondence 1868-1930. IV:
Letters to Mary Rice Jewett, MS Am 1743.1 (241).
Lily Fairchild to Mary Rice Jewett
[ Oct 19 ? ]
[
Begin letterhead ]
153, BRATTLE STREET
CAMBRIDGE
[
End letterhead ]*
[ 1916 ]*
Dearest Mary
The precious little volume has come. I have
of course read it through before telling you of its arrival. I
say I have read it -- but truly I have heard dear Sarah's voice
in my ears, and have seen her lovely face on every page.
You have [ given
corrected ] all her friends this boon
of intimacy I know, & we are all together this day in the
[ Page 2 ]
companionship out of earth which always means for me "The
Communion of the Saints." Surely in some such way of love shall
we all meet --
I find I didn't know the "Boat Song" and the
"Top of the Hill" -- but I know the first is for the Lower
Landing (as I shall always think of it) and the second a
place Sarah drove me to --
was it Sarah or was it you,
dear Mary? You two are so mingled in my thoughts!
[ Page 3 ]
But I know the place: just how the land stretches away from the
deserted dwelling.
I cannot be too thankful that you have done
this thing and preserved the lovely verses. And I [ send
corrected
] my dearest [ thanks
corrected ] to you for my copy.
The next time you are here I must show you my Dunluce -- because
I sadly miss in the book the other stanzas she wrote for me.
We shall welcome the
[ Page 4 ]
rummage (hateful word!) The contributions for the "American
Relief in France" very ardently. People are endlessly
patient and kind to us beggars, but if this most hideous war has
done anything of good it is the softening of so many hearts.
Thank you for the coming box from Berwick.
I am
really well again, though not
quite steady on my pins nor quite able to do the 'chores" tat
take clear-headedness. Nothing does me so much good as the sight
of people I love;
do come to see me!
Gratefully & affectionately yr
Lily Fairchild
Notes
1916: The year in which Jewett's
Verses
was published.
The manuscript of this letter is held by the Houghton Library,
Harvard University, Cambridge, MA. Sarah Orne Jewett additional
correspondence 1868-1930. IV: Letters to Mary Rice Jewett, MS Am
1743.1 (246).
Yesterday there came a box of your
dear sister's and my dear friend's books, which I suppose came
from you. At any rate I thank you for it with a heart warm with
reading in it [Deephaven] in many places. Just now I was
reading to my daughter about that circus, and the lecture to
young men, and we were between laughing and crying. What
beautiful work everywhere. Nobody has ever come near it.
Sometime when you have time and can
copy my letter to your sister suggesting the kind of work she
should best do for the Atlantic, I should be very
grateful for it.
My daughter joins me in love. It was
such a pleasure to see you.
P. S. I shall have my say about your
sister in my introduction to the book of stories.**
Notes
The three great artists, working
always in simple and native stuff, whom I have almost inevitably
grouped together in the order of my acquaintance with their
stories, are collectively, if not severally, without equal among
their contemporaries in their order of fiction. I like the
beautiful art, the gentle nature-love and the delicate humor of
Sarah Orne Jewett because I knew it first as the very junior
editor whom it first came to in settled form, but I do not know
that I value it more than the stories of Mrs. Wilkins Freeman or
the stories of Miss Alice Brown, which I knew with the rest of
the public when they began to appear in response to other
editorial welcome. I think The Revolt of "Mother" had
the widest and warmest welcome from the whole English-reading
world; Miss Brown's story here is fairly suggestive of her
far-reaching study of New England life; and very possibly it is
because of my earlier liking for Sarah Orne Jewett's story that
I like it most ["The Courting of Sister Wisby"]. She is less
dramatic in the piece chosen than the others; the story is
scarcely more than a placid and whimsical study of scene and
character; it was hard to find any story of hers that was more
than a study, but how preciously richer than a story this study
is!