Julia Ward Howe Part 14

For Death's eternal city Has yet some happy street; 'Tis in the Via Felice My friend and I shall meet.

[33] Formerly part of the Via Sistina.

In the summer of 1851 she turned her face westward. The call of husband, children, home, was imperative; yet so deep was the spell which Rome had laid upon her that the parting was fraught with "pain, amounting almost to anguish." She was oppressed by the thought that she might never again see all that had grown so dear. Looking back upon this time, she says, "I have indeed seen Rome and its wonders more than once since that time, but never as I saw them then."

The homeward voyage was made in a sailing-vessel, in company with Mr.

and Mrs. Mailliard. They were a month at sea. In the long quiet mornings Julia read Swedenborg's "Divine Love and Wisdom"; in the afternoons Eugene Sue's "_Mysteres de Paris_," borrowed from a steerage pa.s.senger.

There was whist in the evening; when her companions had gone to rest she would sit alone, thinking over the six months, weaving into song their pleasures and their pains. The actual record of this second Roman winter is found in "Pa.s.sion Flowers."

CHAPTER VII

"Pa.s.sION FLOWERS"

1852-1858; _aet._ 33-39

ROUGE GAGNE

The wheel is turned, the cards are laid; The circle's drawn, the bets are made: I stake my gold upon the red.

The rubies of the bosom mine, The river of life, so swift divine, In red all radiantly s.h.i.+ne.

Upon the cards, like gouts of blood, Lie dinted hearts, and diamonds good, The red for faith and hardihood.

In red the sacred blushes start On errand from a virgin heart, To win its glorious counterpart.

The rose that makes the summer fair, The velvet robe that sovereigns wear, The red revealment could not spare.

And men who conquer deadly odds By fields of ice, and raging floods, Take the red pa.s.sion from the G.o.ds.

Now, Love is red, and Wisdom pale, But human hearts are faint and frail Till Love meets Love, and bids it hail.

I see the chasm, yawning dread; I see the flaming arch o'erhead: I stake my life upon the red.

J. W. H.

We have seen that from her earliest childhood Julia Ward's need of expressing herself in verse was imperative. Every emotion, deep or trivial, must take metrical shape; she laughed, wept, prayed--even stormed, in verse.

Walking with her one day, her sister Annie, always half angel, half sprite, pointed to an object in the road. "Dudie dear," she said; "squashed frog! little verse, dear?"

We may laugh with the two sisters, but under the laughter lies a deep sense of the poet's nature.

As in her dreamy girlhood she prayed--

"Oh! give me back my golden lyre!"--

so in later life she was to pray--

"On the Matron's time-worn mantle Let the Poet's wreath be laid."

The tide of song had been checked for a time; after the second visit to Rome, it flowed more freely than ever. By the winter of 1853-54, a volume was ready (the poems chosen and arranged with the help of James T. Fields), and was published by Ticknor and Fields under the t.i.tle of "Pa.s.sion Flowers."

No name appeared on the t.i.tle-page; she had thought to keep her _incognito_, but she was recognized at once as the author, and the book became the literary sensation of the hour. It pa.s.sed rapidly through three editions; was, she says, "much praised, much blamed, and much called in question."

She writes to her sister Annie:--

"The history of all these days, beloved, is comprised in one phrase, the miseries of proof-reading. Oh, the endless, endless plague of looking over these proof-sheets--the doubts about phrases, rhymes, and expressions, the perplexity of names, especially, in which I have not been fortunate. To-morrow I get my last proof. Then a fortnight must be allowed for drying and binding. Then I shall be out, fairly out, do you hear? So far my secret has been pretty well kept. My book is to bear a simple t.i.tle without my name, according to Longfellow's advice.

Longfellow has been reading a part of the volume in sheets. He says it will make a sensation.... I feel much excited, quite unsettled, sometimes a little frantic. If I succeed, I feel that I shall be humbled by my happiness, devoutly thankful to G.o.d. Now, I will not write any more about it."

The warmest praise came from the poets,--the "high, impa.s.sioned few" of her "Salutatory." Whittier wrote:--

AMESBURY, 29th, 12 mo. 53.

MY DEAR FR'D,--

A thousand thanks for thy volume! I rec'd it some days ago, but was too ill to read it. I glanced at "Rome," "Newport and Rome," and they excited me like a war-trumpet. To-day, with the wild storm drifting without, my sister and I have been busy with thy book, and basking in the warm atmosphere of its flowers of pa.s.sion. It is a great book--it has placed thee at the head of us all. I like its n.o.ble aims, its scorn and hate of priestcraft and Slavery. It speaks out bravely, beautifully all I have _felt_, but could not express, when contemplating the condition of Europe. G.o.d bless thee for it!

I owe an apology to Dr. Howe, if not to thyself, for putting into verse[34] an incident of his early life which a friend related to me.

When I saw his name connected with it, in some of the papers that copied it, I felt fearful that I had wounded, perhaps, the feelings of one I love and honor beyond almost any other man, by the liberty I have taken.

I can only say I could not well help it--a sort of necessity was before me, to say what I did.

[34] "The Hero." See Whittier's _Poems_.

I wish I _could_ tell thee how glad thy volume has made me. I have marked it all over with notes of admiration. I dare say it has faults enough, but thee need not fear on that account. It has beauty enough to save thy "slender neck" from the axe of the critical headsman. The veriest "de'il"--as Burns says--"wad look into thy face and swear he could na wrang thee."

With love to the Doctor and thy lovely little folk,

I am Very sincerely thy friend, JOHN G. WHITTIER.

Emerson wrote:--

CONCORD, Ma.s.s., 30 Dec., 1853.

DEAR MRS. HOWE,--

I am just leaving home with much ado of happy preparation for an absence of five weeks, but must take a few moments to thank you for the happiness your gift brings me. It was very kind in you to send it to me, who have forfeited all apparent claims to such favor, by breaking all the laws of good neighborhood in these years. But you were entirely right in sending it, because, I fancy, that among all your friends, few had so earnest a desire to know your thoughts, and, I may say, so much regret at never seeing you, as I. And the book, as I read in it, meets this curiosity of mine, by its poems of character and confidence, private lyrics, whose air and words [are] all your own. I have not gone so far in them as to have any criticism to offer you, and like better the pure pleasure I find in a new book of poetry so warm with life.

Perhaps, when I have finished the book, I shall ask the privilege of saying something further. At present I content myself with thanking you.

With great regard, R. W. EMERSON.

Oliver Wendell Holmes, always generous in his welcome to younger writers, sent the following poem, never before printed:--

If I were one, O Minstrel wild.

That held "the golden cup"