Hawthorne will accept as it is offered, and as lie
would do if the fate had been reversed. He does not ask you to accept
his gift,--so pay it back when you don't want it, here or hereafter,
or never. I only wish it was a thousand. Dear Sophia, when I think of
such men as your husband, Page, and some others, so pinched and
cramped for this abominable money, it makes me outrageous. If it were
one of those trials that do people good, it would be bearable; but it
kills one down so. Shakespeare felt it when he said:--
"Tired with all these, for restful death I cry, As, to behold desert
a beggar born, And needy nothing trimm'd in jollity."
God bless you, dear Sophia,--as He has, notwithstanding General
Taylor. Believe me ever most affectionately your friend, S. B. S.
Miss Elizabeth Hoar, engaged to Mr. Emerson's brother Charles, who
died in youth, writes letters of regret for the departure of the
Hawthornes from Concord:--
. . . Remember me to Mr. Hawthorne and beautiful Una. That you three
have lived here in Concord for so many fair days is a page of romance
which I shall not forget; whatever happens, so much we have and cannot
lose. Affectionately always,
E. HOAR.
. . . I should like very much to see you and Mr. Hawthorne, and your Una
and her brother, and have made two unsuccessful efforts to spend a day
with you in Salem. I was in New Haven at the time of the publication
of the "Mosses," and all my friends were reading them. I found myself
quite a lion because I knew Mr.
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