File:Frances (Appleton) Longfellow to Isaac Appleton Jewett, 6 January 1842 (77755e68-4941-41d2-a7ff-f4eb91ec52e6).jpg

Manuscript letter

Archives Number: 1011/002.001-012#001

Boston Jan 6th 1842.
Dear Jewett,
Since you had the civility to acknowledge my existence about a month ago, so long apparently forgotten by you, I will be equally civil & thank you. Ever kneading the affairs of this world & the next in your fancy, as your pet Jötuns did their head with hands of giant mould, it is no wonder that such a small crumb as myself should slip thro’ your fingers, - but well-bread (bred) crumbs deserve to be attended to – so you have no excuse, & merit no forgiveness but & such punishment as the digesting of the pun above. Then, for all my fresh sketches of English impressions, my elaborate drawing of Carlyle, & Rachel, & what not you give me the shabby return of two sheets of ideas coined 4 years ago, the edges palpably worn, the stamp dimmed by frequent use, & yet assuming to be just dropped from the mint in your brain. I admit there is as much silver in ‘em as ever & I am happy to see them as old friends but I object to their affectation of juvenility. But, I believe you have the happy faculty of beholding immortal youth in the conceits you love, do not weary of their features so soon as most people, & ever think yourself Columbus on his first voyage. Is it not so? Well, it is a lucky gift & I have always admired the courage of the man who can tell a thrice-told tale without blushing or feeling as if the skulls of centuries were grinning at him. I have not quite arrived at that table land of life when our ideas settle & change not for I suppose there is such a time before they go down hill to ascend higher. I am still climbing & so shifting my views of things from year to year that I sometimes look back on [p. 2] the Past as on the face of a stranger & on my own doings & thinkings therein as on dreams when we are ourselves & some one else at the same time. But there are a few friendly notions that never desert us; & I congratulate you on retaining such a merry & wise company of them to cheer you thro’ the Saraha of the law. Before I forget I wish to ask if you have ever gleaned from Mrs Lambert any particulars of Slocum’s death & last illness. A warm friend of his, Robert Apthorp, has never received, what he most anxiously desires, the details of these; nothing but the bare fact that he was no more. He wrote to his sister at Alexandria to get satisfaction in this matter, & also to enquire the fate of Slocum’s paper’s as among them were letters of his he was anxious to recover, but no answer came, & I suppose because she was then married & away. Now if you will be kind eno’ to mention all this when next you see her & write me the result of your communication it will be a charitable act, for this poor youth had a passionate attachment to him you also valued & will be very grateful, as you would have been, to know how his spirit took flight. I promised to write you for him & as you seem to know her so well, & time must have softened her grief so that it will not pain her to speak of her brother, I trust you may draw from her all she herself knows of his latter days. If his letters were not destroyed could she not get some one to run over their signatures & select Apthorp’s & return them to his hands? You can imagine how distressing it must be to be ignorant of the destiny of one’s letters when strictly private. It is such a risk to write at all that one could not be too diplomatic in their correspondence if it would not disenchant it wholly. You need not expend more eloquence to convince me of your indifference to the Carneal. This cool dissection of her qualifications is a sufficient test of a sane heart. You would not be of Tom’s mind that a damsel whose ideas are in that state of [blacked out] or [blacked out] (harshly called [blacked out] for I wont admit there is ever a [p. 3] blank vacuum) is highly interesting as leaving so much not to be comprehended at a glance! I suppose you saw by the papers how very civil we have been here to our illustrious visitors from the other side – The Prince de Joinville’s ball surpassed the wildest flight of boarding-school misses imaginations & even extorted some superlatives from us sober discriminating travellers [sic] who have seen the Tuileries’ gorgeous melée. Then Lord Morpeth, one of our fellow passengers & a very distinguished & amiable nobleman was [crossed out: fêted] here lately & fêted & dined as if the good people despaired of ever catching a lord again, & now they are in a flutter of expectation for Dickens, as he is probably half seas over by this time. They have not yet decided in what way to honor him but intend something very magnificent. He will probably disappoint our people in his social gifts – instead of having a merry sparkling flow of talk they will find him very shy & silent. I hope the inexhaustibily comic nuances of life here will inspi[re] him to write his best about us. He has nearly exhausted the broo [cut off] traits (by the way do you know we always, unlike the English, pronounce that trates instead of trays) of character in London but will find eno’ here to kindle his humorous vein anew. As to the illustrious ‘blood of all the Howards’ England could not do better as a politic measure than send him to America just now – He is radical enough to love democracy in theory, is overflowing with benevolence & good will to all men & has the happy art of concealing his thoughts when they might offend. He seems honestly pleased with us thus far & makes friends everywhere by his affability & easy good nature. Just the person in short to thaw by the sunshine of a kindly manners the stiff prejudices against John Bull in general & every travelling Englishman in particular. He is a very plain & somewhat awkward specimen of their aristocracy & is a perpetual victim of H.B. the caricaturist. His beautiful sister the Duchess of Southerland, came on board our [p. 4 top] steamer at Liverpool to take leave of him, & wept over him as if seeing him off for another world & not for merely a new side of this. I have just had the happiness to welcome back Miss Austin who has been nearly two months in N. York under an oculist’s care. Her brother must have been sufficiently bored with his Astor life there. You would hardly recognize our once quiet house; - as the atmosphere in the Inferno ever trembleth with the wail of lost souls so here our domestic one doth with the never ceasing plaints of infants. Tom says he might as well be a Mamma himself. We have now [p. 4 bottom] 3 all equally clamorous – especially after dinner. Tom says of Willie that he resembles John the Baptist being “vox clamantis in deserto.” Mary is looking quite like her old sweet self again altho’ not very strong yet. & seems to enjoy home comforts & familiar faces with a new zest from her absence. Aunt Sam is till a sad prisoner to the house, a very severe trial for her enjoying before so much activity & exercise. Her spirits of course flag a little the cure of her lameness is sotedions. Tom is forgetting to abuse American ways & [p. 1 cross] climate in his enthusiasm for the beaux arts, having taken to his easel with great industry & zeal. As for myself – I begin this new Year with a very placid sort of content, happy in the strengthening friendship of many warm friends, in better than my wonted health & in a wholesome enjoyment of all things. May like good fortune be yours for 1842!
With kind remembrances from all
Yrs truly
F.E.A.
[p. 4 cross] I acquit you on the whole of neglecting my letter from England. I think you can never have received it as you had left N.O. about the time it arrived.
ADDRESSED: I.A. JEWETT ESQ. / N. ORLEANS.

• Keywords: correspondence; long archives; frances e. a. longfellow papers (long 20257); frances elizabeth (appleton) longfellow; people; document; social life; death; events; Correspondence (1011/002); (LONG-SeriesName); Letters from Frances Longfellow (1011/002.001); (LONG-SubseriesName); 1842 (1011/002.001-012); (LONG-FileUnitName)