Ever your affectionate M. E. M.
The "letter of praise and thanksgiving" referred to above is as
follows:--
WALTON-ON-THAMES.
MY DEAR HAWTHORNE,--I can't resist the impulse to write a line to you,
in order to thank you for the exquisite pleasure I have derived from
your new romance. Everything that you have ever written, I believe, I
have read many times; and I am particularly vain of having admired
"Lights from a Steeple," when I first read it in the "Boston Token,"
several hundred years ago, when we were both younger than we are now;
and of having detected and cherished, at a later day, an "Old Apple
Dealer," whom I believe that you have unhandsomely thrust out of your
presence, now you are grown so great. But the romance of "Monte Beni"
has the additional charm for me that it is the first book of yours
that I have read since I had the privilege of making your personal
acquaintance. My memory goes back at once to those (alas, not too
frequent, but that was never my fault) walks we used to take along the
Tiber or in the Campagna, during that dark period when your Una was
the cause of such anxiety to your household and to all your friends;
and it is delightful to get hold of the book now, and know that it is
impossible for you any longer, after waving your wand, as you
occasionally did then, indicating where the treasure was hidden, to
sink it again beyond the plummet's sound. I admire the book
exceedingly. I don't suppose that it is a matter of much consequence
to you whether I do or not, but I feel as much disposition to say so
as if it were quite an original and peculiar idea of my own, and as if
the whole world were not just now saying the same thing.
Pages:
366
367
368
369
370
371
372
373
374
375
376
377
378
379
380
381
382
383
384
385
386
387
388
389
390