File:Frances (Appleton) Longfellow to Mary (Longfellow) Greenleaf, 20 March 1854 (f2ef0ef6-1215-4bc9-bf0a-29df3ca0b092).jpg

Manuscript letter

Archives Number: 1011/002.001-024#003

Cambridge. March 20th 1854.
Dear Mary,
Spring has reached us in name & a few days since in delicious reality, with the voice of birds & the balmy breath of May, but from almost oppressive warmth we are again dashed backed into Winter. With you I hope no such trying changes are occurring & your health has steadily gained. I was rejoiced to hear from Caroline Croswell that your old enemy had not returned to molest you, & I hope to see you this summer as strong & rosy as ever.
Poor Mrs Greenleaf, I fear, has felt our very disagreeable winter, with its rapid alterations of intense cold & debilitating thaw, - more racking to the nerves than any one for a long while, [p. 2] & she is now keeping her room, but as the walking becomes good I hope she will be able to get out, if only for a few steps, to brace & cheer her & counteract the fatal influence of a furnace. Lowell, in a late poem in Putnam, treats quite poetically the fire’s revenge for this invention –
Fathom deep men bury thee
In the furnace dark & still,
There with dreariest mockery,
Making thee eat, against thy will,
Blackest Pennsylvanian stone:
But thou dost avenge thy doom,
For, from out thy catacomb,
Day & night thy wrath is blown
In a withering simoom,
And adown that cavern drear
Thy black pitfall in the floor,
Staggers the lusty antique cheer,
Despairing, and is seen no more!
It could hardly be hoped that she should not long feel shattered by such a sudden blow physically as well as mentally, with her feeble framework of health to support it, & you must [p. 3] have been very anxious about her all winter. But now every thing soothing & cheering in nature will come to her aid & that is a nursing not to be despised.
Our household has continued in perfect health. I have recovered my usual well-being with much additional flesh from the potabions of ale I have indulged in & I have turned out a better nurse than I expected. The baby, (as yet nameless but Sam promises to christen her in April) has thriven famously & is very fat & fair, & unsurpassable in goodness day & night. She laughs & crows now with great vigor & promises to have a very happy temperament. She & the others entirely absorb my time. I have not been out a single evening this winter & hardly outside the gate – my throat is still weak & I am prudent, & then my time is so broken up I despair of seeing any one.
Henry is weary at last, & has long been in fact, of more than 20 years of teaching the same things & has abandoned [p. 4] the College to refresh his mind with other thoughts & enjoy perfect freedom. He is now at work there but will [crossed out: leave] this summer slip the harness over his head. Many think we are of course going abroad, but we have no such present intention, & the state Europe is likely to be in will not be very tempting for a long while. The boys wear upon him a good deal with their turbulent life & I think he will be far happier now he has taken this step & lessened the burden of his cares. He has the sensitive, poetical temperament & feels the worry of many things another would not suffer from.
My sister is still quietly in Wales & likely to remain there this summer as the Cholera is in her islands. Ronny has gone to Rugby & the other two are with her under a governess. Her niece Miss Erskine lately made a good marriage & had a very pretty bridal with 12 bridesmaids. She was ‘given away’ by Sir Robert Inglis the great champion of the church & a great friend of Sir James Mackintosh.
I hear rarely from Annie but hope to see her when milder days come. Willy was here last night. He visited his mother [p. 1 cross] during vacation but does not seem to fancy her residence much. Steve has been naughty & we hope will soon go to sea again.
How do the Cenas’ bear their severe affliction? Henry wishes you would express to them his sincere sympathy, & mine I would add for I have felt deeply for her in losing so many hopes.
With much love to James & hoping to hear from you soon
Yr ever affte
Fanny E.L.

• Keywords: correspondence; long archives; frances e. a. longfellow papers (long 20257); frances elizabeth (appleton) longfellow; people; document; henry wadsworth longfellow; subject; health and illness; social life; family life; type; poetry; Correspondence (1011/002); (LONG-SeriesName); Letters from Frances Longfellow (1011/002.001); (LONG-SubseriesName); 1854 (1011/002.001-024); (LONG-FileUnitName)