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

256 LETTERS.
obey the summons to accomplish the work through
means they could not foresee.
TO MIRS. H. W. SEWALL.
WVAYLAND, August 25, 1879.
That Mrs. ~ is the plague of my life. It is the
fourth or fifth time she has been " pervading my department, wanting to know." I don't remember when
the "Juvenile Miscellany " began, and what sort of
interest can it have for the public? An impertinent
reporter of the - interviewed me, and in that paper last June informed the public of the figures in
my carpet and the color of my gown, to which he
appended some literary dates.
Few things'' rile me up " like this impertinent
curiosity, which, after all, is only a fashionable way of
earning a penny without work. There is nothing in
my personal history either " new, useful, or entertaining."
I thank you cordially for the books.... You say
you " like human beings better than books." I like
some human beings better than books, but not many.
Books have one very great advantage over people;
you can put them aside whenever you don't care to
be with them any longer. Moreover, I can make up
a contemptuous mouth and say, " Pshaw! all bosh! "
when a book says what I don't like, but it won't do
to treat people with so much freedom.
TO MISS A. B. FRANCIS.
BOSTON, December 24, 1879.
I know of nothing very interesting in the literary
world," except a small volume called the " Light of
Asia," by the English Mr. Arnold, who married NV.