L[ydia] Maria Child ALS to Lousia Loring, September 4, 1846

at the time of your birth? When and where were you born?
What scenery surrounded you in your childhood? Were you
healthy previous to arriving at maturity? Have you been
healthy since? Are you married? If so, when and where
were you married? Is your husband living? What is his
profession? Are you in easy pecuniary circumstances?
Have you been healthy since your marriage? Have you
children? Did you ever have any children? Do you eat
animal food? What are your peculiar tastes and habits?
Please answer these questions, as I wish to know what
combination of circumstances brought into the world the
author of Letters from New York. At all events, reply
to this letter, as I want your autograph, if I can get nothing
more."

I answered this singular epistle by return of mail. I was half
tempted to reply that I was doubtless brought into the world
by the same combination of circumstances which bring other
people into the world; but fearing he might think that an
improper degree of jocoseness, I merely said that I was very
much like other people; that I had few peculiarities; and the
strongest of them was an extreme love of seclusion, and an
unwillingness to speak of my own emotions and experiences,
except to intimate friends.

Yesterday Professor Stowe, a Baptist, asked so urgently to see
me that I was fain to comply; principally, though because Mr.