After Meeting

Friend of my friend, the looked-for day has come, And we have met: to me, at least, a day Memorable: no hopes have flown away. Bad fears lie broken, stricken henceforth dumb: In the thronged room, and in the ceaseless hum Of many voices, I heard one voice say A few brief words,--but words that did convey A subtle breath of friendship, as in some Few scattered leaves the rose still gives her scent. Thy hand has been in mine, and I this night Have seen thine eyes reach answer eloquent To unseen questions winged for eager flight. And when, at last, our Philip and I went, I knew that I had won a fresh delight.

The following letter from Mr. Sharp explains itself in this cluster of greetings:

William Sharp to Philip Bourke Marston

19 ALBERT STREET, REGENT'S PARK.

DEAR PHILIP: I couldn't be bothered going out anywhere, as you suggested, and an hour or two ago I was able to complete a second sonnet for the two on "Anticipated Friendship" addressed to Mrs. Moulton. I told you how much I liked her, and what a relief it was to find my hopes not disappointed. In reading these sonnets (at least, the second one) remember the dolorous condition I am in, and have mercy on all short-comings that therein abound; and, please, if you think the spirit of thankfulness in them not sufficient to overbalance all deficiencies, throw them in the fire without showing them to their unconscious inspirer, and thus earn the future gratitude of

Your loving friend,

WILLIAM SHARP.

In February of 1887 Philip Bourke Marston died. He bequeathed to Mrs. Moulton his books and manuscripts, and many autographs of great interest and value. Among them was the first page of the original manuscript of the first great chorus in "Atalanta in Calydon" corrected in Swinburne's own hand. Marston requested that she should be his literary executor. Speaking of this work some years later, Mrs. Moulton said:

"When I first knew the Marstons they were a group of five,--dear old Dr. Marston, his son, Philip Bourke Marston, his unmarried daughter Cecily, his married daughter Mrs. Arthur O'Shaughnessy, and her husband. I edited a volume of selections by O'Shaughnessy; and I was named by Mr. Marston, in his will, as his literary executor. I brought out after his death a volume whose contents had not been hitherto included in any book, and which I called 'A Last Harvest.' Then I put all his flower-poems together (as he had long wished to do) in a volume by themselves, which was entitled 'Garden Secrets.' Finally I have brought out a collected edition of his poems, including the three volumes published before his death, and the ones I had compiled after he died.

"Ah, you may well call his life tragic. He was only three years old when he lost his sight. He was educated orally, but his knowledge of literature was a marvel. The poets of the past were his familiar friends, and he could repeat Swinburne's poems by the hour. To recite Rossetti's 'House of Life' was one of the amusements of his solitary days. But he longed, beyond all things, to be constantly in touch with the world--to know what every year, every month, was producing. 'Can you fancy what it is,' he would say to me sometimes, 'to be just walled in with books that you are dying to read, and to have them as much beyond your reach as if they were the other side of the world?' Yet he had, despite his sad fate, the gayest humor--the most naturally cheerful temperament; he could be so merry with his friends--so happy 'when there was anything to be happy about.' Of his work 'Garden Secrets' is uniquely charming. Rossetti once wrote him, in a letter of which I am the fortunate possessor, that he had been reading these 'Garden Secrets,' the evening before, to William Bell Scott, the poet-artist, and adds, 'Scott fully agreed with me that they were worthy of Shakespeare, in his subtlest lyrical moods.' Some of the best critics in London declared that the author of 'Song-Tide' (Marston's first volume) should, by virtue of this one book, take equal rank with Swinburne, Morris, and Rossetti. Certainly his subsequent volumes fully sustained the promise of this first one, and I feel that when Philip Bourke Marston died, at the age of thirty-seven, on the fourteenth of February, 1887, England lost one of her noblest and subtlest poets--one whose future promise it were hard to overrate. Sometimes I think I care most for some of his sonnets; then the subtle beauty of his lyrics upbraids me,--and I hardly know which to choose. Take him all in all, he seems to me a poet whom future generations will recognize and remember."

Regarding the death of Mr. Marston, Mr. Whittier wrote to the friend who had brought so much brightness into the life of the blind poet:

Mr. Whittier to Mrs. Moulton

CENTRE HARBOR, N.H., 7th month, 1887.

MY DEAR FRIEND, LOUISE CHANDLER MOULTON: It was very kind in thee to send thy admirable little book and most welcome letter. We have read thy wise and charming essay up here among the hills, and under the shadow of the pines, with hearty approval. It was needed, and will do a great deal of good to young people, in the matter of manners and morals.

It seems a very long time since I had the great pleasure of seeing thee, or of hearing directly from thee. I meant to have been in Boston in the early spring, and looked forward to the satisfaction of meeting thee, but I was too ill to leave home, and I felt a real pang of regret when I learned of thy departure. I am now much better, but although I cannot say with the Scotch poet that

"the years hang o'er my back And bend me like a muckle pack,"

I must still confess that they are getting uncomfortably heavy. But I have no complaint to make. My heart is as warm as ever, and love and friendship as dear.

I was pained by the death of thy friend, Philip Marston. It must be a comfort to thee to know that thy love and sympathy made his sad lot easier to be borne. He was one who needed love, and I think he was one to inspire it also.

My old and comfortable hotel at Centre Harbor, where I have been a guest for forty years, was burned to ashes a few days ago, after we came away. But we are now in good, neat quarters at a neat farm house, with large cool rooms on the border of the lovely lake.

Good-bye, dear friend! While enjoying thy many friends in London, do not forget thy friends here.

Ever affectionately thy old friend,

JOHN G. WHITTIER.

Herbert E. Clarke, the warm and intimate friend of Marston, touchingly alludes to his death in this sonnet.

TO LOUISE CHANDLER MOULTON.

Ah, friend, the die is cast,--life turns to prose. My way lies onward--dusty, hot, and bare, Through the wide plain under the noonday glare,-- A sordid path whereby no singer goes; For yon the cloudy crags--the stars and snows-- Limitless freedom of ethereal air And pinnacles near heaven. On foot I fare, Halting foredoomed, and toward what goal who knows? But though the singer who may sing no more Bears ever in his heart a smothered fire, I give Fate thanks: nor these my pangs deplore, Seeing song gave first rewards beyond desire-- Your love, O Friend, and his who went before, The sightless singer with his silver lyre.

LONDON, 1st August, 1888.

To Arlo Bates, Mrs. Moulton, reading this, repeated the closing line with a touching tenderness, and then without further word laid the manuscript aside.

In the middle years of the eighties Mrs. Moulton began to send to the Boston Herald a series of literary letters from London, and these she continued for a number of years. She was especially well fitted for the undertaking by her wide acquaintance with English writers, her unusual power of appreciating work not yet endorsed by public approval, and her sympathetic instinct for literary quality. The work, while arduous, gave her pleasure, chiefly because it provided opportunity for her to give encouragement and aid to others, and to help to make better known writers and work not yet appreciated in America. "I am sending a literary letter each week to the Boston Herald," she writes Mr. Stedman. "It is hard work, but it gives me the pleasure of expressing myself about the current literature. I believe the letters are accounted a success."

Many were the letters of gratitude which came to her from those of whom she had written. The sympathetic quality of her approval, so rarely found in combination with critical judgment, made her praise especially grateful. Not only did she interest and enlighten her reading public, but she encouraged and inspired those of whom she wrote.

Other letters of grateful recognition came now and then from artists of whose work she had written in verse. After a visit to the studio of Burne-Jones in London she was inspired to write the admirable and subtle lyric "Laus Veneris," upon his picture of that name.

Pallid with too much longing, White with passion and prayer, Goddess of love and beauty, She sits in the picture there,--

Sits with her dark eyes seeking Something more subtle still Than the old delights of loving Her measureless days to fill.

She has loved and been loved so often, In the long, immortal years, That she tires of the worn-out rapture, Sickens of hopes and fears.

No joys or sorrows move her, Done with her ancient pride; For her head she found too heavy The crown she has cast aside.

Clothed in her scarlet splendor, Bright with her glory of hair, Sad that she is not mortal,-- Eternally sad and fair,--

Longing for joys she knows not, Athirst with a vain desire, There she sits in the picture, Daughter of foam and fire.