Letters of Lydia Maria Child, with a biographical introduction by John G. Whittier and an appendix by Wendell Phillips.

LETTERS. 173
almost my only medium with the world of intellect.
How much my mind has owed to him can never be
described. I loved him, too, and this separation, so
utterly unexpected, rouses up a thousand memories
of childhood and youth. During the last month of
his life I was going backward and forward often to
see him. I was with him the last eight days, and
with him when his soul departed on its mysterious
journey to the unknown. Oh, how I suffered! It
tore me all to pieces. And now, in the spring-time,
I cannot make the renovation of nature seem cheerful. But why should I cast my shadow over you? I
told you of my sad experiences mainly to account for
my neglected correspondence.
I am rejoiced that Robert is so well pleased with
his regiment. The Lord seems to have inspired the
colored people to behave remarkably well all through
this terrible conflict. When I was in Boston, last
week, I said to Edmund Quincy that never in the
course of my observation, or in my reading of human
history, had I seen the hand of Providence so signally
manifested as in the events of this war. He replied
in a very characteristic way: " Well, Mrs. Child,
when the job is done up, I hope it will prove creditable to Providence." My own belief is that it will.
Think of Victor Hugo's writing a tragedy with Jolhn
Brown for its hero! A French John Brown! It is
too funny. I wonder what the old captain himself
would think of it if he were present in Paris at its
representation. I fancy he would be as much surprised at the portraiture as would the honest wife of
Joseph the carpenter, with her troop of dark-eyed
girls and boys, Joses and James and Jude, etc., if
she were told that the image of the "immaculate