Class rESj_35_i Book -/ \ -^ Copyright W - COPYRIQHT DEPOSIT: OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES )XJ.^^ 0^^-^. UJj^aJllM* From Day to Day With Holmes COMPILED BY WALLACE AND FRANCES RICE > NEW YORK BARSE & HOPKINS PUBLISHERS Copyright, 1911, BY BARSE & HOPKINS A\-^ ©CI. A 2 924 8 FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES JANUARY January First Life is a great bundle of little things, I said. The divinity-student smiled. You smile, I said. Perhaps hfe seems to you a little bundle of great things.? The divinity-student started a laugh, but suddenly reined it back with a pull, as one throws a horse on his haunches. — Life is a great bundle of great things, he said. The Autocrat. January Second Storms, thunders, waves ! Howl, crash, and bellow till ye get your fill; Ye sometimes rest; men never can be still But in their graves. Daily Trials. January Third The question is not, what it is reasonable for a man to think about, but what he actually does think about. The Professor at the Breakfast Table. FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES January Foueth Ah ! many lids Love lurks between, Nor heeds the coloring of his screen ; And when his random arrows fly, The victim falls, but knows not why. Gaze not upon his shield of jet, The shaft upon the string is set; Look not beneath his azure veil, Though every limb were cased in mail. The Dilemma. January Fifth Memory is a net ; one finds it full of fish when he takes it from the brook; but a dozen miles of water have run through it without stick- ing. The Autocrat at the Breakfast Table. January Sixth Double vision with the eyes of the heart is a dangerous physiological state, and may lead to missteps and serious falls. Elsie Vernier. January Seventh The maiden's ribbon or ruffle means a great deal more for her than the judge's wig or the priest's surplice. The Guardian Angel. [8] FR OM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES January Eighth Romance ! Was there ever a boarding-house in the world where the seemingly prosaic table had not a living fresco for its background, where you could see, if you had eyes, the smoke and fire of some upheaving sentiment, or the dreary craters of smouldering or burnt-out pas- sions? You look on the black bombazine and high-necked decorum of your neighbor, and no more think of the real life that underlies this despoiled and dismantled womanhood than you thmk of a stone trilobite as having once been full of the juices and the nervous thrills of throbbing and self-conscious being. The Professor. January Ninth One of my friends had a little marble statu- ette of Cupid in the parlor of his country- house, — bow, arrows, wings, and all complete. A visitor, indigenous to the region, looking pensively at the figure, asked the lady of the house "if that was a statoo of her deceased infant.?" What a delicious, though somewhat voluminous biography, social, educational, and esthetic, in that brief question ! The Autocrat. [9] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES >?<>?< >?v >j< vjv >j«c y^v y|y 7?v v;v vj»c vt< >^->jir >jv >;<>;< >j»c January Tenth A very young and very pretty girl is some- times quite charming in a costume which thinks of nothing less than of being attractive. The Guardian Angel. Januaby Eleventh There are women, and even girls, with whom it is of no use to talk. One might as well reason with a bee as to the form of his cell, or with an oriole as to the construction of his swinging nest, as try to stir these creatures from their own way of doing their own work. The Professor. January Twelfth It must be remembered tliat symmetry and elegance of features and figure, like perfectly formed cr^'stals in the mineral world, are reached only by insuring a certain necessary repose to individuals and generations. Elsie Venner. January Thirteenth Good feeling helps society to make liars of most of us, — not absolute liars, but such care- less handlers of truth that its sharp corners get terribly rounded. The Autocrat. [10] I FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES 7P"?t^'>?5r>i< >?< vi< y^i. >}<74^>?v >^ v^ y^'Ojv >?«k >?< >*«c >^ January Fourteenth No man or woman can appropriate beauty without paying for it, — in endowments, in fortune, in position, in self-surrender, or other valuable stock ; and there are a great many who are too poor, too ordinary, too humble, too busy, too proud, to pay any of these prices for it. Elsie Venner. January Fifteenth Provincialism has no scale of excellence in man or vegetable ; it never knows a first rate article of either kind when it has it, and is con- stantly taking second and third rate ones for Nature's best. The Autocrat. January Sixteenth Many young girls have a strange audacity blended with their instinctive delicacy. Even in physical daring many of them are a match for boys ; whereas you will find few among mature women, and especially if they are mothers, who do not confess, and not unfrequently proclaim, their timidity. The Professor. [11] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES y^yis:yfiKVii. >?>?>;<>;< v|< 7^ v?< >?< vjr7?«'>i*r >;<>^ >;<>k January Seventeenth True love leads many wandering souls into the better way. Nor is it rare to see those who started in company for the gates of pearl seated together on the banks that border the avenue to that other portal, gathering the roses for which it is so famous. The Guardian Angel. January Eighteenth I wish I were half as good as many heathens have been. Dying for a principle seems to me a higher degree of virtue than scolding for it; and the history of heathen races is full of in- stances where men have laid down their lives for the love of their kind, of their country, of truth, nay, even for simple manhood's sake, or to show their obedience or fidelity. The Professor. January Nineteenth We may happen to be very dull folks, you and I, and probably are, unless there is some particular reason to suppose the contrary. But we get glimpses now and then of a sphere of spiritual possibilities, where we, dull as we are now, may sail in vast circles round the largest compass of earthly intelligences. The Autocrat. [12] FROIM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES yiKyiK^fKynK yjv >iv>jc>j< >^ >?< 7}^ >jv vjoj^"^ >jv vj«c vj< Januaky Twentieth No Alpine needle, with its climbing spire. Brings down for mortals the Promethean fire, If careless Nature have forgot to frame An altar worthy of the sacred flame. Urania. January Twenty-first Little I ask ; my wants are few ; I only wish a hut of stone, (A very plain brown stone will do,) That I may call my own ; — And close at hand is such a one, In yonder street that fronts the sun. I care not much for gold or land ; Give me a mortgage here and there, — Some good bank-stock, — some note of hand, Or trifling railroad share ; — I only ask that Fortune send A little more than I shall spend. Jewels are baubles ; 'tis a sin To care for such unfruitful things ; — One good-sized diamond in a pin, — Some, not so large, in rings, — A ruby, and a pearl, or so. Will do for me ; — I laugh at show. Contentment. [13] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES >jC7K>j< '/^y^ ViK >;^>|ir yi< >j*c yj*c yj^ >j>c>;^>?^ >?< >j< >j^ January Twenty-second Tlie woman a man loves is always his own daughter, far more his daughter than the fe- male children born to him by the common law of life. It is not the outside woman, who takes his name, that he loves ; before her image has reached the center of his consciousness, it has passed through fifty many-layered nerve-strain- ers, been churned over by ten thousand pulse- beats, and reacted upon by millions of lateral im- pulses which bandy it about through the mental spaces as a reflection is sent back and forth in a saloon lined with mirrors. With this altered image of the women before him, his pre-exist- ing ideal becomes blended. The object of his love is in part the offspring of her legal parents, but more of her lover's brain, Elsie Vernier. January Twenty-third To brag little, — to show well, — to crow gently, if in luck, — to pay up, to own up, and to shut up, if beaten, are the virtues of a sport- ins man. The Autocrat. January Twenty-fourth A great cause makes great souls, or reveals them to themselves. TJic Guardian Angel. [14] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES yfK yyiryiv yjv wv viv >tv >t«c >;«c>jv >;< >^: >?^>jv >i»cv]>c vj«c vj>k January Twenty-fifth Certificates are, for the most part, like os- trich eggs : the giver never knows what is hatched out of them. But once in a thousand times they act as curses are said to, — come home to roost. Give them often enough, until it gets to be a mechanical business, and, some day or other, you will get caught warranting somebody's ice not to melt in any climate, or somebody's razors to be safe in the hands of the youngest children. Elsie Venner January Twenty-sixth Think not too meanly of thy low estate ; Thou hast a choice; to choose is to create! Urania. January Twenty-seventh The hardest duty bravely performed soon be- comes a habit, and tends in due time to trans- form itself into a pleasure. Elsie Vermer. January Twenty-eighth No stranger can get a great many notes of torture out of a human soul; it takes one that knows it well, — parent, child, brother, sister, intimate. The Autocrat. [15] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES >?«( >j< yi< >i»c viv vis wv vix xjx viv >?«c >?«k >?»c >i«c v?«k vi«j yiv viv January Twenty-ninth The narrow moments fit like Sunday shoes, How vast the heap, how quickly must we choose ; A few small scraps from out liis mountain mass We snatch in haste, and let the vagrant pass. TerpsicJiore. January Thirtieth Can any man look round and see what Chris- tian countries are now doing, and how they are governed, and what is the general condition of society, without seeing that Christianity is the flag under which the world sails, and not the rudder that steers its course? The Professor. January Thirty-first Yes, dear departed, cherished days. Could Memory's hand restore Your morning light, your evening rays. From Time's gray urn once more, — Then might this restless heart be still. This straining eye might close. And Hope her fainting pinions fold, While the fair phantoms rose. Departed Days. [16] FROINI DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES FEBRUARY February First Build thee more stately mansions, O my soul, As the swift seasons roll ! Leave thy low-vaulted past! Let each new temple, nobler than the last. Shut thee from heaven with a dome more vast, Till thou at length art free, Leaving thine outgrown shell by life's unrest- ° ' The Chambered Nautilus. February Second There is one disadvantage which the man of philosophical habits of mind suffers, as com- pared with the man of action. While he is tak- ing an enlarged and rational view of the matter before him, he lets his chance slip through his ° ' The Professor, February Third Conscience itself requires a conscience, or nothing can be more unscrupulous. Elsie Vernier. [17] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES '/i< >?< viK >jv >?v vjv viv y(v yjy yjv v^c v^ >jv v?^ >j< >jx- >?< >k February Fourth For that great procession of the unloved, there is no depth of tenderness in my nature that Pity has not sounded. Somewhere, — some- where, — love is in store for them, — the universe must not be allowed to fool them so cruelly. The Autocrat. February Fifth Love works vcr^^ strange transformations in young women. Sometimes it leads them to try every mode of adding to their attractions, — their whole thought is how to be most lovely in the eyes thoy would fill so as to keep out all other images. Poor darlings ! We smile at their lit- tle vanities, as if they were very trivial things; but Nature knows what she is about. The Guardian Angel. February Sixth The more wheels there are in a watch or a brain, the more trouble they are to take care of. The Autocrat. February Seventh Put not your trust in money, but put your money in trust. The Autocrat. [18] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES ■??ir>?^^iv viv y^y v;v y^ y^ >^-7J? y^; yfvv;< >jv vj*; >jv vj^- >j<- February Eighth Oftentimes, as I have lain swinging on the water, in the swell of the Chelsea ferry-boats, in that long, sharp-pointed, black cradle in which I love to let the great mother rock me, I have seen a tall ship glide by against the tide, as if drawn by some invisible tow-line, with a hundred strong arms pulling it. Her sails hung unfilled, her streamers were drooping, she had neither side-wheel nor stern-wheel; still she moved on, stately, in serene triumph, as if with her own life. But I knew that on the other side of the ship, hidden beneath the great hulk that swam so majestically, there was a little toiling steam-tug, with heart of fire and arms of iron, that was hugging it close, and dragging it bravely on ; and I knew that, if the little steam- tug untwined her arms and left the tall ship, it would wallow and roll about, and drift hither and thither, and go off with the refluent tide no man knows whither. And so I have known more than one genius, high-decked, full-freighted, wide-sailed, gay-pennoned, that, but for the bare toihng arms, and brave, warm, beating heart of the faithful little wife, that dragged him on against all the tide of circumstance, would soon have gone down the stream and been heard of no more. The Professor. [19] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLINIES February Ninth There are those who hold the opinion that truth is only safe when diluted — about one-fifth to four-fifths lies — as the oxygen of the air is with its hydrogen. The Guardian Angel. February Tenth Even in common people, conceit has the virtue of making them cheerful ; the man who thinks his wife, his baby, his house, his horse, his dog, and himself severally unequalled, is almost sure to be a good-humored person, though liable to be tedious at times. The Autocrat. February Eleventh Handsome hair, eyes, complexion, feature, form, hand, foot, pleasant voice, strength, grace, agility, intelligence, — how few there are that have not just enough of one at least of these gifts to show them that the good Mother, busy with her millions of children, has not quite forgotten them ! The Professor. February Twelfth Of all liars and false accusers, a sick con- science is the most inventive and indefatigable. Elsie Venner. [20] FROiAI DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES February Thirteenth Youth fades ; love droops ; the leaves of friend- ship fall ; A mother's secret hope outlives them all. A Mother's Secret. February Fourteenth The world has a million roosts for a man, but only one nest. The Autocrat. February Fifteenth A real woman does a great many things with- out knowing why she does them; but these pat- tern machines mix up their intellects with every- thing they do, just like men. They can't help it, no doubt, but we can't help getting sick of them, either. The Professor. February Sixteenth Love moves in an accelerating ratio ; and there comes a time when the progress of the pas- sion escapes from all human formulje, and brings two young hearts, which had been gradually drawing nearer and nearer together, into com- plete union, with a suddenness that puts an in- finity between the moment when all is told and that which went just before. The Guardian Angel. [21] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES y^yi^n^^r^K >?»c>t»c>l«c>?«c>^yj«k >?<>;< >j<7i«? >j< >?< >j«c >j< Februaey Seventeenth Truth is touo^h. It will not break, like a bubble at a touch ; nay, you may kick it about all day, like a football, and it will be round and full at evening. Does not Mr. Bryant say that Truth gets well if she is run over by a locomo- tive, while Error dies of lockjaw if she scratches her finger.? I never heard that a mathematician was alarmed for the safety of a demonstrated proposition. I think, generally, that fear of open discussion implies feebleness of inward con- viction, and great sensitiveness to the expression of individual opinion is a mark of weakness. The Professor. February Eighteenth Nature gets us out of youth into manhood, as sailors are hurried on board of vessels, — in a state of intoxication. We are hustled into maturity reeling with our passions and imagina- tions, and we have drifted far away from port before we awake out of our illusions. But to carry us out of maturity' into old age, without our knowing where we are going, she drugs us with strong opiates, and so we stagger along with wide open eyes that see nothing until snow enough has fallen on our heads to rouse our comatose brains out of their stupid trances. The Autocrat. [22] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES February Nineteenth No fear lest praise should make us proud ! We know how cheaply that is won ; The idle homage of the crowd Is proof of tasks as idly done. Saint Anthony. February Twentieth She appeared to be thirty-five years old, more or less, and looked not badly for that stage of youth, though, of course, she might have been handsomer at twenty, as is often the case with women. The Guardian Angel. February Twenty-first Consciousness of unquestioned position makes people gracious in proper measure to all; but if a woman put on airs with her real equals, she has something about herself or her family she is ashamed of, or ought to be. The Autocrat. February Twenty-second As the Model of all the Virtues is about to leave us, I find myself wondering what is the reason we are not all very sorry. Surely we all like good persons. She is a good person. Therefore wc like her. — Only we don't. The Professor. [23] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES February Twenty-third A certain involuntary adjustment assimilates us, you may also observe, to that upon which we look. Roses redden the cheeks of her who stoops to gather them, and buttercups turn little people's chins ^-ellow. When we look at a vast landscape, our chests expand as if we would en- large to fill it. When we examine a minute ob- ject, we naturally contract, not only our fore- heads, but all our dimensions. If I see two men wrestling, I wrestle too, with my limbs and features. When a country-fellow comes upon the stage, 3'ou will see twenty faces in the boxes putting on the bumpkin expression. There is no need of multiplying instances to reach this generalization ; every person and thing we look upon puts its special mark upon us. If this is repeated often enough, we get a permanent re- semblance to it, or at least a fixed aspect which we took from it. Husband and wife come to look alike at last, as has often been noticed. Tlie Professor. February Twenty-fourth A young man, using large endowments wisely and fortunately, may put himself on a level with the highest in the land in ten brilliant years of spirited, unflagging labor. Elsie Venner. [24] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES yfTffiK x^x >iv >jv >iv>i< vj< >^ 5^ vj»c vj< >I< >j^ >j< >j<>;<>K February Twenty-fifth Every person's feelings have a front-door and a side-door by which they may be entered. The front-door is on the street. Some keep it always open ; some keep it latched ; some, locked ; some, bolted, — with a chain that will let you peep in, but not get in ; and some nail it up, so that nothing can pass its threshold. This front- door leads into a passage which opens into an ante-room, and this into the interior apartments. The side-door opens at once into the sacred chambers. There is almost always at least one key to this side-door. This is carried for years hid- den in a mother's bosom. Fathers, brothers, sisters, and friends, often, but by no means so universally, have duplicates of it. The wedding- ring conveys a right to one; alas, if none is given with it ! The Autocrat. February Twenty-sixth The two women looked each other in the eyes with subtle interchange of intelligence, such as belongs to their sex in virtue of its specialty. Talk without words is half their conversation, just as it is all the conversation of dumb ani- mals. Only the dull senses of men are dead to it as to the music of the spheres. TJic Guardian Angel. [25] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLIMES Viv viv ViV VIV >|V >?< VJV >?< >?< w TrfiT-vp-?!^-?^ vjvvjv: >JK- /^ February Twenty-seventh All who have observed much are aware that some men, who have seen a great deal of life in its less chastened aspects and are anything but modest, will blush often and easily, while there are delicate and sensitive women who can faint, or go into fits, if necessary, but are very rarely seen to betray their feelings in their cheeks, even when their expression shows that their in- most soul is blushing scarlet. Elsie Venner. February Twenty-eighth If the sense of the ridiculous is one side of an impressible nature, it is very well ; but if that is all there is in a man, he had better have been an ape at once, and so have stood at the head of his profession. Laughter and tears are meant to turn the wheels of the same machinery of sensibility ; one is wind-power, and the other water-power; that is all. The Autocrat. February Twenty-ninth Use well the freedom which thy Master gave, (Think'st thou that Heaven can tolerate a slave.?) And He who made thee to be just and true Will bless thee, love thee, — aye, respect thee too ! Urania, [26] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLIMES 7?r>?< yiv y^y ^iv >$< >?«c >?>c>?<>j< >t< y?< >jj«c y^y >jj<>k MARCH March First The sunbeams, lost for half a year, Slant through my pane their morning rays ; For dry Northwesters cold and clear, The East blows in its thin blue haze. And first the snowdrop's bells are seen, Then close against the sheltering wall The tulip's horn of dusky green. The peony's dark unfolding ball. The golden-chaliced crocus burns ; The long narcissus-blades appear; The cone-beaked hyacinth returns, And lights her blue-flamed chandelier. The willow's whistling lashes, wrung By the wild winds of gusty March, With sallow leaflets lightly strung, Are swaying by the tufted larch. Spring has Come. [27] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES March Second When the eyes meet and search each other, It is the uncovering of the blanched stem through which the whole life runs, but which has never taken color or form from the sunlight. Elsie Venner. March Third What a man wants to do, in talking with a stranger, is to get and to give as much of the best and most real life that belongs to the two talkers as the time will let him. Life is short, and conversation apt to run to mere words. The Professor. March Fourth Nothing is so common-place as to wish to be remarkable. Fame usually comes to those who are thinking about somctliing else, — very rarely to those who say to themselves, "Go to, now, let us be a celebrated individual !" The Autocrat. March Fifth Where go the poet's lines? — Answer, ye evening tapers ! Ye auburn locks, ye golden curls, Speak from your folded papers ! The Poefs Lot. [28] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES x^y xiv xiv >4V viv Viv Hv y|< viv V|«c vt< >;< vtoiv y^y y^v ^v >j< March Sixth The average intellect of five hundred persons, taken as they come, is not very high. It may be sound and safe, so far as it goes, but it is not very rapid or profound. The Autocrat. March Seventh Love shuts itself up in sympathy like a knife- blade in its handle, and opens as easily. The Guardian Angel. March Eighth Beliefs must be lived in for a good while, before they accommodate themselves to the soul's wants, and wear loose enough to be comfortable. Elsie Vernier. March Ninth In choosing your clergyman, other things be- ing equal, prefer the one of a wholesome and cheerful habit of mind and bod}^ If you can get along with people who carry a certificate in their faces that their goodness is so great as to make them very miserable, your children can- not. And whatever offends one of these little ones, cannot be right in the eyes of Him Who loved them so well. The Professor. [29] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLINIES y^r^fKiffs: >?< vjvvjv hv hv y*v >iv >iv viv v^v yf^yj^ >?^ >?< >?^ March Tenth The miserable routinists who keep repeating invidiously Cowper's "God made the country and man made the town," as if the town were a place to kill the race in, do not know what they are talking about. Is the dark and damp cavern where a ragged beggar hides Iiimself better than a town-mansion which fronts the sunshine and backs on its own shadow? God made the cavern and man made the house ! What then? Elsie Venner. March Eleventh Don't you know how hard it is for some peo- ple to get out of a room after their visit is really over? They want to be off, and you want to have them off, but they don't know how to manage it. One would think they had been built in your parlor or study, and were waiting to be launched. The Autocrat. March Twelfth I have often observed that vulgar persons, and public audiences of inferior collective in- telligence, have this in common: the least thing draws off their minds when you are speaking to them. The Professor. [30] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES x*x x^x x^x xix yjy >tv yjv i^T^-^ vj< 1^ >?*^>ys:7p-?jirsjr7^ March Thirteenth An overworked woman is always a sad sight, sadder a great deal than an overworked man, because she is so much more fertile in capacities of suffering than a man. Elsie Venner. March Fourteenth I would have a woman as true as Death. At the first real lie which works from the heart out- ward, she should be tenderly chloroformed into a better world, where she can have an angel for a governess, and feed on strange fruits which will make her all over again, even to her bones and marrow. The Autocrat. March Fifteenth A young fellow, born of good stock, in one of the more thoroughly civilized portions of these United States of America, bred in good principles, inheriting a social position wliich makes him at his ease everywhere, means suffi- cient to educate him thoroughly without taking away the stimulus to vigorous exertion, and with a good opening in some honorable path of labor, is the finest sight our private satellite has had the opportunity of inspecting on the planet to which she belongs. The Professor. [31] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES >j< >j<^>j< >?<>?< 71^7?^ >??7j^>j»r>;<>j<>j^>j<>jvvj<>j<>K March Sixteenth Sin has many tools, but a lie is the handle which fits them all. The Autocrat. March Seventeenth I find that there is a very prevalent opinion among the dwellers on the shores of Sir Isaac Newton's Ocean of Truth, that salt fish, which have been taken from it a good while ago, split open, cured, and dried, are the only proper and allowable food for reasonable people. I main- tain, on the otlier hand, that there are a number of live fish still swimming in it, and that every one of us has a right to see if he cannot catch some of them. Sometimes I please myself with the idea that I have landed an actual living fish, small, perhaps, but with rosy gills and silvery scales. Then I find the consumers of nothing but the salted and dried article insist that it is poisonous, simply because it is alive, and cry out to people not to touch it. I have not found, however, that people mind them much. The Professor. March Eighteenth The best thought, like the most perfect diges- tion, is done unconsciously. The Guardian Angel. [32] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES X4X Xi^Ky^y^Ky^ x;x y|x x^V y^ y^ >♦< 7?i"^y>iy xix 4 V y^y yt^ March Nineteenth Don't flatter yourselves that friendship au- thorizes jou to say disagreeable things to your intimates. On the contrary, the nearer you come into relation with a person, the more necessary do tact and courtesy become. Except in cases of necessity, which are rare, leave your friend to learn unpleasant truths from his ene- mies ; they are ready enough to tell them. Good-breeding never forgets that amour-propre is universal. The Autocrat. March Twentieth Every event that a man would master must be mounted on the run, and no man ever caught the reins of a thought except as it galloped by him. The Professor. March Twenty-first It is well that young persons cannot read the fatal oracles of Nature. Blind impulse is her highest wisdom, after all. We make our great jump, and then she takes the bandage off our eyes. That is the way the broad sea-level of average is maintained, and the physiological democracy is enabled to fight against the prin- ciple of selection which would disinherit all the weaker children. Elsie Venner. [33] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES March Twenty-second Winter is past; the heart of Nature warms Beneath the wrecks of unresisted storms ; Doubtful at first, suspected more than seen, The southern slopes are fringed with tender green ; On sheltered banks, beneath the dripping eaves, Spring's earliest nurslings spread their glowing leaves, Bright with the hues from wider pictures won. White, azure, golden, — drift, or sky, or sun ; — The snowdrop, bearing on her patient breast The frozen trophy torn from winter's crest; The violet, gazing on the arch of blue Till her own iris wears its deepened hue; The spendthrift crocus, bursting through the mould. Astrcea. March Twenty-third By every hill whose stately pines Wave their dark arms above The home where some fair being shines. To warm the wilds with love, From barest rock to bleakest shore Where farthest sail unfurls. That stars and stripes are streaming o'er, — God bless our Yankee girls ! Our Yankee Girls, [34] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES March Twenty-fourth He had a good deal in him of what he used to call the Old Man, which, as he confessed, he had never succeeded in putting off, — meaning thereby certain qualities belonging to humanity, as much as the natural gifts of the dumb crea- tures belong to them, and tending to make a man beloved by his weak and erring fellow- inortals. The Guardian Angel. March Twenty-fifth Every word we speak is the medal of a dead thought or feeling, struck in the die of human experience, worn smooth by innumerable con- tacts, and always transferred warm from one to another. Elsie Venner. March Twenty-sixth Facts always yield the place of honor in con- versation to thoughts about facts. The Autocrat. March Twenty-seventh The real religion of the world comes from women much more than from men — from mothers most of all, who carry the key of our souls in their bosoms. The Professor. [35] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES March Twenty-eighth Habit Is the approximation of the animal sys- tem to the orfranlc. It Is a confession of failure in the highest function of being, wliich involves a perpetual self-determination, in full view of all existing circumstances. But habit, you see, is an action in present circumstances from past motives. It Is substituting a vis a tergo for the evolution of living force. The Professor. March Twenty-ninth 'TIs but the fool that loves excess ; — hast thou a drunken so\i\? Thy bane Is in thy shallow skull, not in my silver bowl! On Lending a Punch-Bowl. March Thirtieth You never need think 3'ou can turn over any old falsehood without a terrible squirming and scattering of the horrid Uttle population that dwells under it. The Autocrat. March Thirty-first The recollection of a deep and true affection is rather a divine nourishment for a life to grow strong upon than a poison to destroy it. Elsie Venner. [36] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES APRIL April First I hear the whispering voice of Spring, The thrush's trill, the cat-bird's cry. Like some poor bird with prisoned wing That sits and sings, but longs to flj. O for one spot of living green, — One little spot where leaves can grow, — To love unblamed, to walk unseen. To dream above, to sleep below! Spring has Come. April Second The opinions of relatives as to a man's powers are very commonly of Httle value; not merely because they sometimes overrate their own flesh and blood, as some may suppose; on the contrary, they are quite as likely to under- rate those whom they have grown into the habit of considering like themselves. The Autocrat. [37] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES April Third There are no better maxims for ladies who give tea-parties than these: Cream is thicker tlian water. Large heart never loved little cream-pot. Elsie Venner. April Fourth The brain is the palest of all the internal organs, and the heart the reddest. Whatever comes from the brain carries the hue of the place it came from, and whatever comes from the heart carries the heat and color of its birth- place. The Professor. April Fifth If a man really loves a woman, of course he wouldn't marry her for the world, if he were not quite sure that he was the best person she could by any possibility marry. The Autocrat. April Sixth How patient Nature smiles at Fame! The weeds, that strewed the victor's way, Feed on his dust to shroud his name. Green where his proudest towers decay. A Roman Aqueduct. [88] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES April Seventh To know whether a minister, young or still in flower, is in safe or dangerous paths, there are two psychometers. The first is the black broadcloth forming the knees of his pantaloons ; the second, the patch of carpet before his mir- ror. If the first is unworn and the second is frayed and threadbare, pray for him. If the first is worn and shiny, while the second keeps its pattern and texture, get him to pray for you. The Guardian Angel. April Eighth A portrait is apt to be a surprise to us. The artist looks onl}'^ from without. He sees us, too, with a hundred aspects on our faces we are never likely to see. No genuine expression can be studied by the subject of it in the looking-glass. The Professor. April Ninth When one of us who has been led by native vanity or senseless flattery to think himself or herself possessed of talent arrives at the full and final conclusion that he or she is really dull, it is one of the most tranquilizing and blessed convictions that can enter a mortal's mind. The Autocrat. [39] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES April Tenth No, my friends, I go (always, other things being equal) for the man that inherits family traditions and the cumulative humanities of at least four or five generations. Above all things, as a child, he should have tumbled about in a hbrary. All men are afraid of books, that have not handled them from infancy. The Autocrat. April Eleventh Whatever may be the cause, it is well known that the announcement at any private rural entertainment that there Is to be ice cream pro- duces an immediate and profound Impression. It may be remarked, as aiding this impression, that exaggerated ideas prevail as to the danger- ous effects this congealed food may produce on persons not in the most robust health. Elsie Vermer. Apbil Twelfth There is nothing earthly that lasts so well, on the whole, as money. A man's learning dies with him; even his virtues fade out of remem- brance ; but the dividends on tlic stocks he be- queaths to his children live and keep his memory green. The Professor, [40] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES April Thirteenth . . . The green earth, beneath the zephyr's wing, Wears on her breast the varnished buds of Spring, When the loosed current, as its folds uncoil, Slides in the channels of the mellowed soil; When the young hyacinth returns to seek The air and sunshine with her emerald beak ; When the light snowdrops, starting from their cells, Ilang each pagoda with its silver bells ; When the frail willow twines her trailing bow With pallid leaves that sweep the soil below; When the broad elm, sole empress of the plain. Whose circling shadow speaks a century's reign, Wreathes in the clouds her regal diadem, — A forest waving on a single stem. Poetry: A Metrical Essay. April Fourteenth These beauties that grow and ripen against the city walls, these young fellows with cheeks like peaches and young girls with cheeks like nectarines, show that the most perfect forms of artificial life can do as much for the human product as garden-culture for strawberries and blackberries. Elsie Venner, [41] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES April Fifteenth There must be other things besides aerolites that wander from their own spheres to ours ; and when we speak of celestial sweetness or beauty, we may be nearer the literal truth than we dream. The Autocrat. April Sixteenth At a certain period of life, say from fifty to sixty and upward, the grand-^nicrnfA instinct awakens in bachelors, the rhythms of Nature reaching them in spite of her defeated inten- tions ; so that when they marry late they love their autumn child with a twofold affection, — father's and grandfather's both in one. The Guardian Angel. April Seventeenth A little clear perfection, undiluted with hu- man weakness, goes a great way. The Professor. April Eighteenth There is no galvanism in kiss-3'our-brother ; it is copper against copper ; but alien bloods develop strange currents, when they flow close to each other, with onl}^ the films that cover lip and check between them. Elsie Venner. [42] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES April, Nineteenth A woman who does not carry a halo of good feeling and desire to make everybody about con- tented with her wherever she goes, — an atmos- phere of grace, mercy, and peace, of at least six feet radius, which wraps every human being upon whom she voluntarily bestows her presence, and so flatters him with the comfortable thought that she is rather glad he is alive than other- wise, isn't worth the trouble of talking to, as a •woman; she may do well enough to hold dis- cussions with. The Professor. April Twentieth Where there is one man who squints with his eyes, there are a dozen who squint with their brains. It is an infirmity in the eyes, making the two unequal in power, that makes men squint. Just so is it an inequality in the two halves of the brain that makes some men idiots and others rascals. The Guardian Angel, April Twenty-first A hat which has been popped, or exploded by being sat down upon, is never itself again after- wards. It is a favorite illusion of sanguine natures to believe the contrary. The Autocrat. [43] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES T^y^KyfKyfK'j^yfiViK viw^v vjvvj^ vjvvk >;^>|<>?<">??7K April Twenty-second The spiritual standard of different classes I would reckon thus: — 1. The comfortably rich. 2. The decently comfortable. 3. The very rich, who are apt to be irreligious. 4. The very poor, who are apt to be immoral. The Professor. April Twenty-third Beware of making your moral staple consist of the negative virtues. It is good to abstain, and teach others to abstain, from all that is sin- ful or hurtful. But making a business of it leads to emaciation of character, unless one feeds largely .also on tlic more nutritious diet of active sympathetic benevolence. The Autocrat. April Twenty-fourth People, young or old, are wonderfully dif- ferent, if we contrast extremes in pairs. They approach much nearer, if we take them in groups of twenty. Take two hundred as they come, without choosing, and you get the gamut of human character in both so completely that you strike many chords in each which shall be in perfect unison with corresponding ones in the other. Elsie Vernier. [4i] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES yfTf^ /jy /tK y^v viv v{v yi< vj< y^f >i< -^ y;< '/iKy$Kyfry$Kyp: April Twenty-fifth The elms have robed their slender spray With full-blown flower and embryo leaf; Wide o'er the clasping arch of day Soars like a cloud their hoary chief. See the proud tulip's flaunting cup, That flames in glory for an hour, — Behold it withering, — then look up, — How meek the forest-monarch's flower ! — When wake the violets, Winter dies ; When sprout the elm-buds. Spring is near ; When lilacs blossom, Summer cries, "Bud, little roses ! Spring is here !" Spring has Come. April Twenty-sixth Every real thought on every real subject knocks the wind out of somebody or other. As soon as his breath comes back, he very prob- ably begins to expend it in hard words. The Autocrat. April Twenty-seventh Do you know the pathos there is in the eyes of unsought women, oppressed with the burden of an inner life unshared.'' Elsie Venner. [45] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES April Twenty-eighth Once more the pulse of Nature glows With faster throb and fresher fire, While music round her pathway' flows Like echoes from a hidden lyre. And is there none with me to share The glories of the earth and sky? The eagle through the pathless air Is followed b}^ one burning eye. From a Bachelor's Journal. April Twenty-ninth The heart makes the theologian. Every race, every civilization, either has a new revelation of its own or a new interpretation of an old one. Democratic America has a different humanity from feudal Europe, and so must have a new divinity. The Professor. April Thirtieth At last young April, ever frail and fair. Wooed by her plavmate with the golden hair, Chased to the margin of receding floods O'er the soft meadows starred with opening buds, In tears and blushes sighs herself away, And hides her cheek beneath the flowers of May. Astrtra. [46] FROIVI DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES y^ir^yiK >?< v?«c vt< >jv >j< >j< >j< vj< >^ v;«c v?^ >?< v?v >t< >K MAY May First Look at Nature. She never wearies of saying over her floral paternoster. In the crevices of C^^clopcan walls, — in the dust where men lie, dust also, — on the mounds that bury huge cities, the Birs Nimroud and the Babel-heap, — still that same sweet prayer and benediction. The Amen! of Nature is always a flower. The Autocrat. May Second The windows blush with fresh bouquets, Cut with the May-dew on their lips ; The radish all its bloom displays. Pink as Aurora's finger-tips. Nor less the flood of light that showers On beauty's changed corolla-shades, — The walks are gay as bridal bowers With rows of many-petalled maids. Spring has Come. [47] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES jMay Third The red heart sends all its instincts up to the white brain to be anah'zcd, chilled, blanched, and so become pure reason, which is just exactly what we do not want of woman as woman. The current should run the other wa}'. The nice, calm, cold thought, which in women shapes itself so rapidly that they hardly know it as thought, should always travel to the lips via the heart. It does so in those women whom all love and admire. The Professor. INIay Fourth When those who parted as children meet as man and woman, there is always a renewal of that early experience which followed the taste of the forbidden fruit, — a natural blush of consciousness, not without its charm. Elsie Venner. May Fifth Oh, what are the prizes we perish to win To the first little "shiner" we caught with a pin ! No soil upon earth is so dear to our eyes As the soil we first stirred in terrestrial pies! At the Berkshire Festival. [48] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES May Sixth Of a hundred people of each of the different leading religious sects, about the same propor- tion will be safe and pleasant persons to deal and to live with. The Professor. May Seventh The beauty of good breeding is that it ad- justs itself to all relations without effort, true to itself always, however the manners of those around it may change. Elsie Venner. ]May Eighth Easy-crying widows take new husbands soon- est ; there is nothing like wet weather for trans- planting. The Guardian Angel. May Ninth All generous minds have a horror of what are commonly called "facts." They are the brute beasts of the intellectual domain. Who does not know fellows that always have an ill- conditioned fact or two that they lead after them into decent company like so many bull- dogs, ready to let them slip at every ingenious suggestion, or convenient generalization, or pleasant fancy.'' The Autocrat, [49] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOOIES May Tenth Sharp business habits, a lean soil, independ- ence, enterprise, and east winds, are not the best things for the larynx. Still, you hear noble voices among us, — I have known families famous for them, — but ask the first person you meet r, question, and ten to one there is a hard, sharp, metallic, matter-of-business clink in the accents of the answer, that produces the effect of one of those bells which small trades-people connect with their shop-doors, and which spring upon your ear with such vivacity, as you enter, that your first impulse is to retire at once from the precincts. The Autocrat. May Eleventh I sometimes think women have a sixth sense, which tells them that others, whom they cannot see or hear, are in suffering. The Professor. May Twelfth Men who see into their neighbors are very apt to be contemptuous ; but men who see through them find something lying behind every human soul which it is not for them to sit in judgment on, or to attempt to sneer out of the order of God's manifold universe. Elsie Vcnner. [50] FROIM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES May Thirteenth Women are twice as religious as men ; all the world knows that. Whether they are any bet- ter, in the eyes of Absolute Justice, might be questioned ; for the additional religious element supplied by sex hardly seems to be a matter of praise or blame. But in all common aspects they are so much above us that we get most of our religion from them, — from their teachings, from their example, — above all, from their pure affections. The Professor, May Fourteenth You think yourself a very fastidious young man, my friend; but there are probably at least five thousand young women in these United States, any one of whom you would certainly marry, if you were thrown much in her com- pany, and nobody more attractive were near, and she had no objection. Elsie Venner^ May Fifteenth She who nips off the end of a brittle courtesy, as one breaks the tip of an icicle, to bestow upon these whom she ought cordially and kindly to recognize, proclaims the fact that she comes not merely of low blood, but of bad blood. The Autocrat. [51] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES May Sixteenth If the Devil could only appear in church by attorney, and make the best statement that the facts would bear him out in doing on behalf of his special virtues (what we commonly call vices), the influence of good teachers would be much greater than it is. For the arguments by Avhich the Devil prevails are precisely the ones that the Devil-quelier most rarely answers. The Autocrat. May Seventeenth Nature took him into her confidence. She loves the men of science well, and tells them all her family secrets, — who is the father of this or that member of the group, who is brother, sister, cousin, and so on, through all the circle of relationship. But there are others to whom she tells her dreams; not what species or genus her lily belongs to, but what vague thought it has when it dresses in white, or what memory of its birthplace that is which we call its fra- grance. The Guardian Angel. May Eighteenth What a miserable thing it is to be poor ! Elsie Vernier. [52] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES >^ >?«;: >!«? /.4»i Mi\ xix x^y >j»i: >K W v^c vjk- >;v: >jir7j^-^->j^7|^ May Nineteenth The apron-strings of an American mother are made of india-rubber. Her boy belongs where he is wanted. The Professor. May Twentieth The woods are all alive to one who walks through them with his mind in an excited state, and his eyes and ears wide open. The trees are always talking, not merely whispering with their leaves (for every tree talks to itself in that way, even when it stands alone in the middle of a pasture), but grating their boughs against one another, as old, horn-handed farmers press their dry, rustling palms together, dropping a nut or a leaf or a twig, clicking to the tap of a woodpecker, or rustling as a squirrel flashes along a branch. Elsie Venner. May Twenty-first She did not announce any opinion; but she made a sound which the books write humph! but which real folks make with closed lips, thus : m'!, implying that there is a good deal which might be said, and all the vocal organs want to have a chance at it, if there is to be any talking. The Guardian Angel. [53] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES May Twexty-second I can't help remembering tliat the world's great men have not commonly been great scholars, nor its great scholars great men. The Autocrat. May Twexty-tiiikd The unbeautiful get many more lovers than the beauties; only, as there are more of them, their lovers are spread thinner and do not make so much show, Elsie Venner. May Twenty-fourth The man whose opinions are not attacked is beneath contempt. The Professor. I\Iay Twenty-fifth There is no possible success without some op- position as a fulcrum: force is always aggres- sive, and crowds something or other, if it does not hit or trample on it. The Guardian Angel. ^Iay Twenty-sixth I find the great thing in this world is not so much where we stand, as in what direction we are moving. The Autocrat. [54] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES May Twenty-seventh I love sweet features ; I will own That I should like myself To see my portrait on a wall, Or bust upon a shelf; But nature sometimes makes one up Of such sad odds and ends, It really might be quite as well Hushed up among one's friends ! To the Portrait of "^ Ladyr May Twenty-eighth If jealousies that gnaw men's hearts out of their bodies, — if pangs that waste men to shadows and drive them into raving madness or moping melancholy, — if assassination and sui- cide are dreadful possibilities, then there is al- ways- something frightful about a lovely young woman. The Autocrat. May Twenty-ninth The old political wire-pullers never go near the man they want to gain, if they can help it; they find out who his intimates and managers are, and work through them. Always handle any positively electrical body, whether it is charged with passion or power, with some non- conductor between you and it, not with naked hands. Elsie Vcnner. [55] FRO^M DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES May Thirtieth Dowdyism Is clearly an expression of Imper- fect vitality. The highest fashion is intensely alive, not alive necessarily to the truest and best things, but with its blood tingling, as it were, in all its extremities and to the farthest point of its surface, so that the feather in its bonnet is as fresh as the crest of a fighting-cock, and the rosette on its slipper as clean-cut and pirn- pant (pronounce it English fashion, — it is a good word) as a dahlia. As a general rule, that society where flattery is acted is much more agreeable than that where it is spoken. Don't you see why? Attention and deference don't re- quire you to make fine speeches expressing 3'our sense of unworthincss (lies) and returning all the compliments paid 3'ou. This is one reason. The Professor. ]\Iay Thirty-first Grieve, as thou must, o'er history's reeking page ; Blush for the wrongs that stain thy happier age; Strive with the wanderer from the better path, Bearing thy message meekly, not in wrath ; Weep for the frail that err, the weak that fall. Have thine own faith, — but hope and pray for all ! Urania. [56] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES JUNE June First Every sense and faculty was awake to the manifold delicious, mysterious impressions of that wonderful June night. The stars were shining between the tall trees, as if all the jewels of heaven had been set in one belt of midnight sky. The voices of the wind, as they sighed through the pines, seemed like the breath of a sleeping child, and then, as they lisped from the soft, tender leaves of beeches and maples, like the half-articulate whisper of the mother hush- ing all the intrusive sounds that might awaken it. The Guardian Angel. June Second The lily shrinks, and the rose turns pale, When they feel its breath in the summer gale, And the tulip curls its leaves in pride, And the blue-eyed violet starts aside; But the lily may flaunt, and the tulip stare, For what does the honest toadstool care? The Toadstool. [57] ■FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES June Third It was now the season of singing-birds, and the woods were haunted with mysterious, tender music. The voices of the birds which love the deeper shades of the forest are sadder than those of the open fields : these are the nuns that have taken the veil, the hermits that have hidden themselves away from the world to tell their griefs. Elsie Venner. June Fourth The sound of a kiss is not so loud as that of a cannon, but its echo lasts a deal longer. The Professor. June Fifth Women love the conquering party, — it is the way of tlieir sex. TJie Guardian Angel. June Sixth Your self-made man, whittled into shape with his own jack-knife, deserves more credit, if that is all, than the regular engine-turned article, shaped by the most approved pattern, and French-polished by society and travel. But as to saying that one is every way the equal of the other, that is another matter. The Autocrat, [58] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES yisr^yfi: yf^yf^yiK v?«c v?< i^ >jv y|< vt*. v;^ wn ■/(< yfi. 7*??7?ir June Seventh Billionism, or even millionlsm, must be a blessed kind of state, with health and clear con- science and good looks, — but most blessed in this, that it takes off all the mean cares which give people the three wrinkles between the eye- brows, and leaves them free to have a good time and make others have a good time, all the way along from the charity that tips up unexpected loads of wood before widows' houses, and leaves foundling turkeys upon poor men's doorsteps, and sets lean clergymen crying at the sight of anonymous fifty-dollar bills, to the taste which orders a perfect banquet in such sweet accord with every sense that everybody's nature flowers out full-blown in its golden-glowing, fragrant atmosphere. Elsie Venner. June Eighth The whole essence of true gentle-breeding (one does not like to say gentilit}') lies in the wish and the art to be agreeable. Good-breed- ing is Surface-Christianity. Every look, move- ment, tone, expression, subject of discourse, that may give pain to another is habitually ex- cluded from conversational intercourse. This is the reason why rich people are apt to be so much more agreeable than others. The Professor, [59] FROINI DAY TO DAY WITH HOOIES y^Kyi^yt^yfTfi^yii. >;< vii. >tv >j< >!«;: >?ir7?ir>?c7??^7i? June Ninth Men is men and gals is gals. I wouldn't trust no man, not ef he was much under a hun- dred year old, and as for a gal ! The Guardian Angel. June Tenth We must have a weak spot or two in a char- acter before we can love it much. People that do not laugh or cry, or take more of anything than is good for them, or use anything but dic- tionary-words, are admirable subjects for bio- graphics. But we don't always care most for those flat-pattern flowers that press best in the herbarium. The Professor. June Eleventh Remember that Nature makes every man love all women, and trusts the trivial matter of spe- cial choice to the commonest accident. Elsie Venner. June Twelfth How curious it is that we always consider solemnity and the absence of all gay surprises and encounter of wits as essential to the idea of the future life of those whom we thus deprive of half their faculties and then call blessed! The Autocrat. [60] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES June Thirteenth Many a woman rejects a man because he is in love with her, and accepts another because he is not. The first is thinking too much of him- self and his emotions, — the other is making a study of her and her friends, and learns what ropes to pull. The Guardian Angel. June Fourteenth Unpretending mediocrity is good, and genius is glorious ; but a weak flavor of genius in an essentially common person is detestable. It spoils tlie grand neutrality of a common-place character, as the rinsings of an unwashed wine- glass spoil a draught of fair water. The Autocrat. June Fifteenth I hope I love good men and women ; I know that they never speak a word to me, even if it be of question or blame, that I do not take pleasantly, if it is expressed with a reasonable amount of human kindness. The Professor. June Sixteenth All our other features were made for us ; but a man makes his own mouth. Elsie Venner. [61] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES June Seventeenth There are about as many twins in the births of thought as of children. For the first time in your hvcs you learn some fact or come across some idea. Within an hour, a day, a week, that same fact or idea strikes you from another quarter. It seems as if it had passed into space and bounded back upon you as an echo from the blank wall that shuts in the world of thought. Yet no connection exists. The Professor. June Eighteenth Little localized powers, and little narrow streaks of specialized knowledge, are things men are very apt to be conceited about. Nature is very wise ; but for this encouraging principle how many small talents and little accomplish- ments would be neglected ! Talk about conceit as much as you like, it is to human character what salt is to the ocean ; it keeps it sweet, and renders it endurable. Say rather it is like the natural unguent of the sea-fowl's plumage, which enables him to shed the rain that falls on him and the wave in which he dips. When one has had all conceit taken out of him, when he has lost all his illusions, his feathers will soon soak through, and he will fly no more. The Autocrat. [62] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES June Nineteenth Better too few words from the woman we love than too many : while she is silent, Nature is working for her ; while she talks, she is work- ing for herself. Love is sparingly soluble in the words of men ; therefore they speak much of it ; but one syllable of woman's speech can dissolve more of it than a man's heart can hold. The Autocrat. June Twentieth A man of sense, — that is, a man who knows perfectly well that a cool head is worth a dozen warm hearts in carrying the fortress of a woman's affections, who knows that men are re- jected by women every day because they do not, and therefore can study the arts of pleasing, — a man of sense, when he finds he has established his second parallel too soon, retires quietly to his first, and begins working on his covered ways again. Elsie Venner. June Twenty-first Religion and government appear to me the two subjects which, of all others, should belong to the common talk of people who enjoy the blessings of freedom. The Professor, [63] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES June Twenty-second It is by no means certain that our individual personality is the single inhabitant of these our corporeal frames. . . . Thus, at one moment we detect the look, at another the tone of voice, at another the characteristic movement of this or that ancestor, in our relations or others. There are times when our friends do not act like themselves, but apparently in obedience to some other law than that of their own proper nature. We all do things both awake and asleep which surprise us. Perhaps we have cotenants in this house we live in. The Guardian Angel. June Twenty-third If we should compare a young girl's man-as- she-thinks-him with a forty-sunimcrcd matron's man-as-shc-finds-him, I have my doubts as to whether the second would be a facsimile of the first in most cases. The Professor. June Twenty-fourth Fit the same intellect to a man and it is a bow-string, — to a woman and it is a harp- string. She is vibratile and resonant all over, so she stirs with slighter musical tremblings of the air about her. The Autocrat. [6i] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES June Twenty-pifth ^ I don't know anything sweeter than this leak- ing m of Nature through all the cracks in the walls and floors of cities. You heap up a million tons of hewn rocks on a square mile or two of earth which was green once. The trees look down from the hill-sides and ask each other, as they stand on tiptoe,-"What are these people about .P" And the small herbs at their feet look up and whisper back,— "We will go and see » bo the small herbs pack themselves up in the least possible bundles, and wait until the wind steals to them at night and whispers,— "Come with me." Then they go softly with it into the great city,-one to a cleft in the pavement, one to a spout on the roof, one to a seam in the marbles over a rich gentleman's bones, and one to the grave without a stone where nothing but a man is buried,-and there they grow, looking doM-,1 on the generations of men from mouldy roofs, looking up from between the less-trodden ralir'"*'' ^''''^''"^ """* *^"'''"^^' "'°" cemetery- ^ "^^^' The Autocrat. June Twenty-sixth Don't believe no wrong of nobody, not till y' '""'*• The Guardian Angel IQ5^ FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES yiK '^ v?«c ys< yi< yi< Viv Viv j^y^yti. >ik >?< '/^ y^y^ June Twenty-seventh The education of our community to all that is beautiful is flowing in mainly through its women. Elsie Vcnner. June Twenty-eighth The physician in the Arabian Nights made his patient play at ball with a bat, the hollow handle of which contained drugs of marvelous efficacy. Whether it was the drugs that made the sick man get well, or the exercise, is not of so much consequence as the fact that he did at any rate get well. The Guardian Angel. June Twenty-ninth The very aim and end of our institutions is just this: that we may think what we like and say what we think. The Professor. June Thirtieth You know, that, if you had a bent tube, one arm of which was of the size of a pipe-stem, and the other big enough to hold the ocean, water would stand at the same height in one as in the other. Controversy equalizes fools and wise men in the same way, — and the fools know it. The Autocrat. 166^ FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES JULY July First The woods at first convey the impression of profound repose, and yet, if you watch their ways with open ear, you find that the hfe which is in them is restless and nervous as that of a woman : the httle twigs are crossing and twining and separating like slender fingers that cannot be still ; the stray leaf is to be flattened into its place like a truant curl; the limbs sway and twist, impatient of their constrained attitude; and the rounded masses of fohage swell upward and subside with long soft sighs. Elsie Vernier. July Second Relations are apt to hate each other, just because they are too much alike. Elsie Venner. July Third The common human qualities are more than all exceptional gifts. The Guardian Angel. [67] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES July Fourth I am an American, — and wherever I look up and see the stars and stripes overliead, that is home to me! The Autocrat, July Fifth Once in a while, even in our Northern cities, at noon, in a very hot summer's day, one may reahze, by a sudden extension in his sphere of consciousness, how closely he is shut up for the most part. — Do you not remember something like this? July, between 1 and 2 p. m., Fahren- heit 90 deg., or thereabout. Windows all gap- ing, like the mouths of panting dogs. Long, stinging cry of a locust comes in from a tree, half a mile off; had forgotten there was such a tree. Baby's screams from a house several blocks distant ; — never knew there were any babies in the neighborhood before. Tinman pounding something that clatters dreadfully, — very distinct but don't remember any tinman's shop near by. Horses stamping on pavement to get off flies. When you hear these four sounds, you may set it down as a warm day. The Professor. [68] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES July Sixth We talk about our free institutions ; they are nothing but a coarse outside machinery to se- cure the freedom of individual thought. The President of the United States is only the en- gine-driver of our broad-gauge mail train ; and every honest, independent thinker has a seat in the first-class cars behind him. The Professor. July Seventh A young farmer was urged to set out some apple-trees. — No, said he, they are too long growing, and I don't want to plant for other people. The young farmer's father was spoken to about it, but he, with better reason, alleged that apple-trees were slow and life was fleeting. At last some one mentioned it to the old grand- father of the young farmer. He had nothing else to do, — so he stuck in some trees. He lived long enough to drink barrels of cider made from the apples that grew on those trees. The Autocrat, July Eighth A person's appetite should be at war with no other purse than his own. Elsie Venner. [69] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES July Ninth People that make puns are like wanton boys that put coppers on the raih'oad tracks. They amuse themselves and other children, but their little trick may upset a freight train of conver- sation for the sake of a battered witticism. The Autocrat. July Tenth Although in the abstract we all love beauty, and although, if we Avere sent naked souls into some ultramundane warehouse of soulless bodies and told to select one to our liking, we should each choose a handsome one, and never think of the consequences, — it is quite certain that beauty carries an atmosphere of repulsion as well as attraction with it, alike in both sexes. Elsie Venner. July Eleventh Is there not one little drawer in your soul, my sweet reader, which no hand but yours has ever opened, and which none that have known you seem to have suspected? What does it hold.'* A sin.'* — I hope not. The Professor. [70] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES vt^ytKj^vtK yiKyfi. vto;*: >k v^ >?v >;< >tv >?< vjy vjvtj^t?? July Twelfth Under bad manners, as under graver faults, lies very commonly an overestimate of our spe- cial individuality, as distinguished from our generic humanity. It is just here that the very highest society asserts its superior breeding. Among truly elegant people of the highest ton, you will find more real equality in social inter- course than in a country village. The Professor. July Thirteenth The greatest saint may be a sinner that never got down to hard pan. The Guardian Angel. July Fourteenth The soul of a man has a series of concentric envelopes round it, like the core of an onion, or the innermost of a nest of boxes. First, he has his natural garment of flesh and blood. Then, his artificial integuments, with their true skin of solid stuflTs, their cuticle of lighter tissues, and their variouslj^-tinted pigments. Thirdly, his domicile, be it a single chamber or a stately mansion. And then, the whole visible world, in which Time buttons him up as in a loose outside wrapper, The Autocrat, 171] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES July Fifteenth Our young men come into active life so early, that, if our girls were not educated to something beyond mere practical duties, our material pros- perity would outstrip our culture; as it often does in large places where money is made too rapidly. Elsie Vernier. July Sixteenth It is such a sad thing to be born a sneaking fellow, so much worse than to inherit a hump- back or a couple of club-feet, that I sometimes feel as if we ought to love the crippled souls, if I may use this expression, Avith a certain tender- ness which we need not waste on noble natures. One who is born with such congenital incapacity that nothing can make a gentleman of him is entitled, not to our wrath, but to our profound- est s^^mpathy. But as we cannot help hating the sight of these people, just as we do that of physical deformities, we gradually eliminate them from our society, — we love them, but open the window and let them go. The Autocrat. July Seventeenth With most men life is like backgammon, half skill and half luck. The Guardian Angel. FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES July Eighteenth O Nature ! bare thy loving breast And give thy child one hour of rest, One little hour to lie unseen Beneath thy scarf of leafy green ! So curtained by a singing pine, Its murmuring voice shall blend with mine, Till, lost in dreams, my faltering lay In sweeter music dies away. Midsummer. July Nineteenth There are, at least, three real saints among the women, to one among the men, in every de- nomination. The Professor. July Twentieth Marry a girl while she's in the gristle, and you can shape her bones for her. The Guardian Angel. July Twenty-first Ah, it is the pale passions that arc the fiercest, — it is the violence of the chill that gives the measure of the fever ! The Autocrat. [73] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES xnK -/^ yfK XIX xitK ypi. vivv^c >jv v;vvj< >?< yiKyf^y^KyiKi^yf^: July Twenty-second Plain food is quite enough for me; Three courses are as good as ten ; — If Nature can subsist on three, Thank Heaven for three. Amen ! I always thought cold victuals nice ; — My choice would be vanilla-ice. Contentment. July Twenty-third We very commonly mean by beauty the way young girls look when there is nothing to hinder their looking the wa}^ Nature meant them to. Elsie Vcnner. July Twenty-fourth Women are apt to love the men who they think have the largest capacity of loving. The Professor. July Twenty-fifth The right of strict social discrimination of all things and persons, according to their merits, native or acquired, is one of the most precious republican privileges. I take the liberty to exercise it when I say that, other things be- ing- equal, in most relations of life I prefer a man of family. The Autocrat. FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES July Twenty-sixth Who knows it not, — this dead recoil Of weary fibers stretched with toil ; The pulse that flutters faint and low When Summer's seething breezes blow? Midsummer. July Twenty-seventh It ain't everybody that can ride to heaven in a C-spring shay ; and life's a road that's got a good many thank-you-ma'ams to go bumpin' over. The Guardian Angel. July Twenty-eighth Talk about it as much as you like, — one's breeding shows itself nowhere more than in his religion. A man should be a gentleman in his hymns and prayers. The Autocrat. July Twenty-ninth What I can't stand is the sight of these poor, patient, toiling women, who never find out in this life how good they are, and never know what it is to be told they are angels while they still wear the pleasing incumbrances of human- ity. Elsie Venner. [75] FRO]\I DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES >?v >;< >j< v?v viv vj«c>tv: >j< y^ya >;^ >j«^ vjo^ojif w yfm^ July Thirtieth Nothing is better known than the distinction of social ranks which exists in every community, and nothing is harder to define. The great gen- tlemen and ladies of a place are its real lords and masters and mistresses ; they are the quality, whether in a monarchy or a republic ; mayors and governors and generals and senators and ex-presidents arc nothing to them. How well we know this, and how seldom it finds a distinct expression ! The Professor. July Thirty-first Nature is liberal to her inmost soul, She loves alike the tropic and the pole. The storm's wild anthem, and the sunshine's calm, The arctic fungus, and the desert palm; Loves them alike, and wills that each maintain Its destined share of her divided reign ; No creeping moss refuse her crystal gem. No soaring pine her cloudy diadem ! Astrcea. [76] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES AUGUST August First Look at the flower of a morning-glory the evening before the dawn which is to see it un- fold. The delicate petals are twisted in a spiral, which at the appointed hour, when the sunlight touches the hidden springs of its life, will un- coil itself and let the day into the chamber of its virgin heart. But the spiral must unwind by its own law, and the hand that shall try to hasten the process will only spoil the blossom. The Guardian Angel. August Second I love to hear thine earnest voice, Wherever thou art hid. Thou testy little dogmatist, Thou pretty Katydid! Thou 'mindcst me of gentlefolks, — Old gentlefolks are tlicy, — Thou say'st an undisputed thing In such a solemn way. To an Insect. [77] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES yi< y^ >?< vpi vfi. yi< viv v^v yp^y^'j^yiayvK yi\ >?»( 7^ >?<:■??«? August Third A mean man never agrees to an^'thing with- out deliberately turning it over, so that he may see its dirty side, and, if he can, sweating the coin he pays for it. If an archangel should offer to save his soul for sixpence, he would try to find a sixpence with a hole in it. Elsie Vernier. August Fourth It is not our beliefs that frighten us half so much as our fancies. The Professor. August Fifth A man is always pleased to have his most serious efforts praised, and the highest aspect of his nature get the most sunshine. The Autocrat. August Sixth Wear seemly gloves ; not black, nor yet too light, And least of all the pair that once was white; Let the dead party where you told your loves Bury in peace its dead bouquets and gloves ; Shave like the goat, if so your fancy bids. But be a parent, — don't neglect your kids. Urania. [78] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES >t<^ >t< >t< >^- v?< >j< >?<>;< >t< >?v >;v >j»c v;v >iv >?< >j<^ 7^ >jir August Seventh There are a great many more clouds than rains, and more rains than strokes of lightning, and more strokes of lightning than there are people killed. Elsie Venner. August Eighth The world is always ready to receive talent with open arms. Very often it does not know what to do with genius. Talent is a docile creature. It bows its head meekly while the world slips the collar over it. It backs into the shafts like a lamb. It draws its load cheer- fully, and is patient of the bit and of the whip. But genius is always impatient of its harness ; its wild blood makes it hard to train. The Autocrat. August Ninth Life is like that, one stitch at a time, taken patiently, and the pattern will come out all right, like the embroidery. The Guardian Angel. August Tenth A lame man's opinion of dancing is not good for much. The Professor. [79] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES >j< wiKi^y^ Mfi. yfi. yfi. )^ >K>^' ytf >j^"??r7?ir7ic7i?7K>?>r August Eleventh I love the damask rose best of all. The flowers our mothers and sisters used to love and cherish, those which grow beneath our eaves and by our doorstep, are the ones we always love best. The Autocrat. August Twelfth We often move to the objects of supreme curi- osity, not in the lines of castle and bishop on the chess-board, but with the knight's zigzag, making believe to ourselves that we are not after the thing coveted. The Guardian Angel. August Thirteenth The arguments which the greatest of our schoolmen could not refute were two: the blood in men's veins, and the milk in women's breasts. The Professor. August Fourteenth The virtue of the world is not mainly in its leaders. In the midst of the multitnjde which follows there is often something better than in the one that goes before. Elsie Venner, [80] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES y^ Viv Viv viKyp: '/;< •;^< vj< y^yii:yiKyfKKp:w:y$i:y^y;i:y(^ August Fifteenth Some people think that gold and truth are alwaj's to be Avashcd for ; but the wiser sort are of opinion that, unless there are so many grains to the peck of sand or nonsense respectively, it does not pay to wash for cither, so long as one can find anything else to do. Elsie Vermer. August Sixteenth But, O my friend ! my favorite fellow-man ! If Nature made you on her modern plan, Sooner than wander with your windpipe bare, — The fruit of Eden ripening in the air, — With that lean head-stalk, that protruding chin. Wear standing collars, were they made of tin ! And have a neck-cloth — by the throat of Jove! Cut from the funnel of a rusty stove ! Urania. August Seventeenth Put an idea into your intelligence and leave it there an hour, a day, a year, without ever having occasion to refer to it. When, at last, you return to it, you do not find it as it was when acquired. It has domiciliated itself, so to speak, — become at home, — and integrated itself with the whole fabric of the mind. The Autocrat. 181] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES August Eighteenth Among the visible objects which hint to us fragments of this infinite secret for which our souls are waiting, the faces of women are those that carry the most legible hieroglyphics of the great mystery. There are women's faces, some real, some ideal, which contain something in them that becomes a positive element in our creed, so direct and palpable a revelation is it of the infinite purity and love. The Professor. August Nineteenth It is not in the words others say to us, but in those other words which these make us say to ourselves, that we find our gravest lessons and our sharpest rebukes. The Guardian Angel. August Twentieth Father of all ! in Death's relentless claim We read Thy mercy by its sterner name; In the bright flower that decks the solemn bier, We see Thy glory in its narrowed sphere; In the deep lessons that affliction draws. We trace the curves of Thy encircling laws ; In the long sigh that sets our spirits free, We own the love that calls us back to Thee ! Pittsfleld Cemetery » [82] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES August Twenty-first We jog quietly along, meeting the same faces, grinding over the same thoughts, — the gravel of the soul's highway, — now and then jarred against an obstacle Ave cannot crush, but must ride over or around as we best may, sometimes bringing short up against a disappointment, but still working along with the creaking and rattling and grating and jerking that belong to the journey of life, even in the smoothest-roll- ing vehicle. Suddenly we hear the deep under- ground reverberation that reveals the unsus- pected depth of some abyss of thought or pas- sion beneath us. The Professor. August Twenty-second "Some things can be done as well as others." A homely utterance, but it has virtue to over- throw all dynasties and hierarchies. These were all built up on the Old-World dogma that some things can not be done as well as others. The Guardian Angel. August Twenty-third The man zmth a future has almost of necessity sense enough to see that any odious trick of speech or manners must be got rid of. The Autocrat. [83] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES August Twenty-fourth Getting married is jumping overboard, any way you look at it, and if you must save some woman from drowning an old maid, try to find one zvith a cork jacket, or she'll carry you down with her. The Guardian Angel. August Twenty-fifth If we compare the population of two villages of the same race and region, there is such a regularly graduated distribution and parallel- ism of character, that it seems as if Nature must turn out human beings in sets like chess- men. Elsie Vermer. August Twenty-sixth It is the folly of the world constantly which confounds its wisdom. Not only out of the mouths of babes and sucklings, but out of the mouths of fools and cheats, we may often get our truest lessons. For the fool's judgment is a dog-vane that turns with a breath, and the cheat watches the clouds and sets his weather- cock by them, — so that one shall often see by their pointing which way the winds of heaven are blowing, when the slow-wheeling arrows and feathers of what we call the Temples of Wisdom are turning to all points of the compass. The Professor. I FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES Mi< /^x MiK y/fK viv viv Hv v^x wiKyiKyiKy^yiK -j^ vt^ -^niKyfi: August Twenty-seventh Everybody likes and respects self-made men. It is a great deal better to be made in that way than not to be made at all. Are any of you younger people old enough to remember that Irishman's house on the marsh at Cambridge- port, which house he built from drain to chim- ney-top with his own hands? It took him a good many years to build it, and one could see that it was a little out of plumb, and a little wavy in outline, and a httle queer and uncertain in general aspect. A regular hand could cer- tainly have built a better house; but it was a very good house for a "self-made" carpenter's house, and people praised it, and said how re- markably well the Irishman had succeeded. They never thought of praising the fine blocks of houses a little farther on. The Autocrat. August Twenty-eighth Wherever two natures have a great deal in common, the conditions of a first-rate quarrel are furnished ready-made. Elsie Venner. August Twenty-ninth Humility is the first of the virtues — for other people. The Professor. 185] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES 1^ ytK^i^ wiK viv >?»; viv vjvw >?vvj< >?<>?< >j«r w:sic>??->k August Thirtieth You talk of the fire of genius. Many a blessed woman, who dies unsung and unremem- bered, has given out more of the real vital heat that keeps the life in human souls, without a spark flitting through her humble chimney to tell the world about it, than would set a dozen theories smoking, or a hundred odes simmering, in the brains of so many men of genius. The Professor. August Thirty-first Leave what you've done for what you have to do; Don't be "consistent," but be simply true. Don't catch the fidgets ; you have found your place Just in the focus of a nervous race, Fretful to change, and rabid to discuss, Full of excitements, always in a fuss ; — Think of the patriarchs ; then compare as men These lean-cheeked maniacs of the tongue and pen! Run, if you like, but trj^ to keep your breath; Work like a man, but don't be worked to death; And with new notions, — let me change the rule, Don't strike the iron till it's slightly cool. Urania. [86] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES SEPTEMBER September First Though from the Hero's bleeding breast Her pulses Freedom drew, Though the white lilies in her crest Sprang from that scarlet dew, — While Valor's haughty champions wait Till all their scars are shown, Love walks unchallenged through the gate, To sit beside the Throne! The Two Armies. September Second People are always glad to get hold of any- thing which limits their responsibility. Elsie Venner. September Third You may teach a quadruped to walk on his hind legs, but he is always wanting to be on all- fours. The Professor. [87] frojm day to day with holmes September Fourth I'm not a cliicken ; I have seen Full many a chill September, And though I was a youngster then, That gale I well remember ; The day before, my kite-string snapped, And I, my kite pursuing, The wind whisked off my palm-leaf hat ; — For me two storms were brewing! The September Gale. September Fifth Faith always implies the disbelief of a lesser fact in favor of a greater. A little mind often sees the unbelief, without seeing the belief, of a large one. The Professor. September Sixth The seed that wasteful Autumn cast To waver on its stormy blast, Long o'er the wintry desert tost, Its living germ has never lost ; Dropped by the weary tempest's wing, It feels the kindling ray of Spring, And starting from its dream of death, Pours on the air its perfumed breath. To an English Friend. [88] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES >?<>?j< >?<->;j< W >j>f vi>c y^ viv 'j^yiKyp: September Seventh Do you know that every man has a religious belief peculiar to himself? Smith is always a Smithite. He takes in exactly Smith's-worth of knowledge, Smith's-worth of truth, of beauty, of divinity. And Brown has from time imme- morial been trying to burn him, to excommuni- cate him, to anonymous-article him, because he did not take in Brown's-worth of knowledge, truth, beauty, divinity. He cannot do it, any more than a pint-pot can hold a quart, or a quart-pot be filled by a pint. Iron is essentially the same everywhere and always ; but the sul- phate of iron is never the same as the carbonate of iron. Truth is invariable; but the Smithate of truth must always differ from the Brownate of truth. The Professor. September Eighth Men are tattooed with their special beliefs like so many South Sea Islanders ; but a real human heart, with divine love in it, beats with the same glow under all the patterns of earth's thousand tribes. Elsie Venner. September Ninth The cut nails of machine-divinity may be driven in, but they won't clinch. The Professor. [89] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES September Tenth No more the summer floweret charms, The leaves will soon be sere, And Autumn folds his jeweled arms Around the dying year. The Island Hunting Song. September Eleventh Ah, the young girl ! I am sure that she can hide nothing from me. Her skin is so trans- parent that one can almost count her heart-beats by the flushes they send into her cheeks. She does not seem to be shy, either. I think she does not know enough of danger to be timid. She seems to me like one of those birds that travelers tell of, found in remote, uninhabited islands, who, having never received any wrong at the hand of man, sliow no alarm at and hardly any particular consciousness of his presence. The Professor. September Twelfth A plain girl in a simple dress, if she has only a pleasant voice, may seem almost a beauty in the rosy twilight. The nearer she comes to being handsome, the more ornament she will bear, and the more she can defy the sunshine or the chandelier. The Guardian Angel. [90] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES yfK viO^viKytK viv v^v yiV">?<^ w >j< >?< >;<7?^">??7?^>?<";^ September Thirteenth Peace to the ever murmuring race ! And when the latest one Shall fold in death her feeble wings Beneath the autumn sun, Then shall she raise her fainting voice And lift her drooping lid, And then the child of future years Shall hear what Katy did. To an Insect. September Fourteenth It is very easy to criticize other people's modes of dealing with their children. Outside observers see results ; parents see processes. To be a parent is almost to be a fatalist. Elsie Venner. September Fifteenth I think you will find that people who honestly mean to be true really contradict themselves much more rarely than those who try to be "consistent." But a great many things we say can be made to appear contradictorj'-, simply because they are partial views of a truth, and may often look unlike at first, as a front view of a face and its profile often do. The Professor. [91] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES yt< V4V wiK y^K yii. yi< y^i. yii. y^ v?«c>?^->t<:>;<:>K September Sixteenth I don't want a woman to weigh me in a bal- ance ; there are men enough for that sort of work. The judicial character isn't captivating in females, sir. A woman fascinates a man quite as often by what she overlooks as by what she sees. Love prefers twilight to daylight ; and a man doesn't think much of, nor care much for, a woman outside of his household, unless he can couple the idea of love, past, present, or future, with her. I don't believe the Devil would give half as much for the services of a sinner as he would for those of one of these folks that are always doing virtuous acts in a way to make them unpleasing. The Professor. September Seventeenth We are all splashed and streaked with senti- ments, — not with precisely the same tints, or in exactly the same patterns, but by the same hand and from the same palette. The Autocrat. September Eighteenth Like many people of strong and imperious temper, he was soft-voiced and very gentle in his address, when he had no special reason for being otherwise. Elsie Venner. [92] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES September Nineteenth Now, when genius allies itself with character, the world is very apt to think character has the best of the bargain, A brilliant woman marries a plain, manly fellow, with a simple intellectual mechanism : we have all seen such cases. The world often stares a good deal and wonders. She should have taken that other, with a far more complex mental machinery. She might have had a Avatch with the philosophical com- pensation-balance, with the metaphysical index, which can split a second into tenths, with the musical chime which can turn every quarter of an hour into melody. She has chosen a plain one, that keeps good time, and that is all. Let her alone! She knows what she is about. Genius has an infinitely deeper reverence for character than character can have for genius. The Professor. September Twentieth A man's love is the measure of his fitness for good or bad company here or elsewhere. Elsie Vermer. September Twenty-first The most pathetic image in the world to many women is that of themselves in tears. The Guardian Angel. [93] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES September Twenty-second She came of a cultivated stock, never rich, but long trained to intellectual callings. A thousand decencies, amenities, reticences, graces, which no one thinks of until he misses them, are the traditional right of those who spring from such families. Elsie Veniier. September Twenty-third Once more : speak clearly, if you speak at all ; Carve every word before you let it fall. Urania. September Twenty-fourth Now I tell you a poem must be kept and used, like a meerschaum, or a violin. A poem is just as porous as the meerschaum ; — the more porous it is, the better. I mean to say that a genuine poem is capable of absorbing an indefinite amount of the essence of our own humanity, — its tenderness, its heroism, its regrets, its aspira- tions, so as to be gradually stained through with a divine secondary color derived from ourselves. So you see it must take time to bring the senti- ment of a poem into harmon}'^ with our nature, by staining ourselves through every thought and image our being can penetrate. The Autocrat, [91] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES >t?< v?< v?»c Hv Viv y;y 7^ >j<>?< v?iv >j?'"??ic September Twenty-fifth Wealth's wasteful tricks I will not learn, Nor ape the glittering upstart fool; — Shall not carved tables serve my turn. But all must be of buhl ? Give grasping pomp its double share, — I ask but one recumbent chair. Contentment. Septembee Twenty-sixth . You forget what a miserable surface-matter this language is in which we try to reproduce our interior state of being. Articulation is a shallow trick. From the light Poh! which we toss off from our lips as we fling a nameless scribbler's impertinence into our waste-baskets, to the gravest utterance which conies from our throats in our moments of deepest need, is only a space of some three or four inches. Words, which are a set of clickings, hissings, hspings, and so on, mean very little compared to tones and expression of the features. The Professor. September Twenty-seventh No hfe worth naming ever comes to good If always nourished on the self-same food. Astrcea. [95] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES September Twenty-eighth Clear the brown path, to meet his coulter's gleam ! Lo ! on he comes, behind his smoking team. With toil's bright dew-drops on liis sunburnt brow. The lord of earth, the hero of the plow! The PloTvman. September Twenty-ninth Keep your temper — one angry man is as good as another. Elsie Venner. September Thirtieth He must be a poor creature that does not often repeat himself. Imagine the author of the excellent piece of advice, "Know thyself," never alluding to that sentiment again during the course of a protracted existence! Why, the truths a man carries about with him are his tools ; and do you tliink a carpenter is bound to use the same plane but once to smooth a knotty board with, or to hang up his hammer after it has driven its first nail? A thought is often original, though you have uttered it a hundred times. It has come to you over a new route, by a new and express train of associations. The Professor. [96] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES OCTOBER October First Not in the world of light alone, Where God has built his blazing throne, Nor yet alone in earth below, With belted seas that come and go, And endless isles of sunlit green, Is all thy Maker's glory seen : Look in upon thy wondrous frame, — Eternal wisdom still the same ! The Living Temple. October Second An emotion which can shape itself in language opens the gate for itself into the great com- munity of human affections. Elsie Vernier. October Third Without wearing any mask we are conscious of, we have a special face for each friend. The Professor. [97] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES October Fourth How many "women arc born too finely organ- ized in sense and soul for the highway they must walk with feet unshod! Life is adjusted to the wants of the stronger sex. There are plenty of torrents to be crossed in its journey; but their stepping-stones are measured b}' the stride of man, and not of woman. The Professor. October Fifth But, like a child in ocean's arms, We strive against the stream, Each moment farther from the shore Where life's young fountains gleam; — Each moment fainter wave the fields. And wider rolls the sea ; The mist grows dark, — the sun goes down, — Day breaks, — and where are we? Departed Days. October Sixth A gentleman says yes to a great many things without stopping to think: a shabby fellow is known by his caution in answering questions, for fear of compromising his pocket or himself. Elsie Vcnner. [98] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES >?<>i< >t«c 7^ w >j«? >?< y^Ki^yiK w >K vj< w w >??>?«^>i5^ October Seventh If one has a house which he has hved and always means to hve in, he pleases himself with the thought of all the conveniences it offers him, and thinks little of its wants and imperfections. But once having made up his mind to move to a better, every incommodity starts out upon him, until the very ground-plan of it seems to have changed in his mind, and his thoughts and affections, each one of them packing up its little bundle of circumstances, have quitted their sev- eral chambers and nooks and migrated to the new home, long before its apartments are ready to receive their bodily tenant. The Professor. October Eighth There never was a guild of dealers or a com- pany of craftsmen that did not need sharp looking after. The Autocrat. October Ninth I tell you what, philosopher, if all the longest heads That ever knocked their sinciputs in stretching fine old folks Were round one great mahogany, I'd beat those fine old folks With twenty dishes, twenty fools, and twenty clever jokes. Nux Postcosnatica. [99] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES October Tenth Where, oh where are the visions of morning, Fresh as the dews of our prime? Gone, hke tenants that quit without warning, Down the back entry of time. Questions and Answers. October Eleventh Nobody talks much that doesn't say unwise things, things he did not mean to say ; as no person plays much without striking a false note sometimes. Talk, to me, is only spading up the ground for crops of thought. I can't answer for what will turn up. If I could, it wouldn't be talking, but "speaking my piece." Better, I think, the hearty abandonment of one's self to the suggestions of the moment, at the risk of an occasional slip of the tongue, perceived the instant it escapes, but just one syllable too late, than the royal reputation of never saying a foolish thing. The Professor. October Twelfth It is wonderful how men and women know their peers. If two stranger queens, sole sur- vivors of two shipwrecked vessels, were cast, half-naked, on a rock together, each would at once address the other as "Our Royal Sister." Elsie Venner. [100 J FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES >{< >t< viK v?«c VK >t< VK >;<>K>^ >?<>?t<>?«k >j«r yj< vjK >?< vjK >jV7yr>H w >t< >j< >;< >?< 7?? >?<■>?<■ October Nineteenth Between two breaths what crowded mysteries lie, — The first short gasp, the last and long-drawn sigh! Like phantoms painted on the magic slide. Forth from the darkness of the past we glide, As living shadows for a moment seen In airy pageant on the eternal screen. Traced by a ray from one unchanging flame, Then seek the dust and stillness whence we came. Urania. October Twentieth Our ice-eyed brain-women are really admir- able, if we only ask of them just what they can give, and no more. The Professor. October Twenty-first Real Republicanism is stem and severe ; its essence is not in forms of government, but in the omnipotence of public opinion which grows out of it. The Autocrat. October Twenty-second The difference between the real and the ideal objects of love must not exceed a fixed maxi- mum. The heart's vision cannot unite them stereoscopically into a single image, if the di- vergence passes certain limits. Elsie Venner. [103] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES >?< >?< vi< v?>c>jjir >j< >jojv vt<^ viK yi< y^K >j<7?«r>i^ >t<::^ OcTOBEE Twenty-third Justice! A good man respects the rights even of brute matter and arbitrary symbols. If he writes the same word twice in succession, by accident, he ahvays erases the one that stands second; has not the first-comer the prior right? This act of abstract justice, which I trust many of my readers, like myself, have often per- formed, is a curious anti-illustration, by the way, of the absolute wickedness of human dis- positions. Why doesn't a man always strike out the first of the two words, to gratify his diabolical love of injustice? The Prof essor. October Twenty-fourth What are the great faults of conversation? Want of ideas, want of words, want of manners, are the principal ones, I suppose you think, I don't doubt it, but I will tell you what I have found spoil more good talks than anything else; ' — long arguments on special points between people who differ on the fundamental principles upon which these points depend. The Autocrat. October Twenty-fifth Life is dreadful uncerting, said the poor relation. The Professor. [104<] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES >}< vt< >jvv;< >?>c>3>c>^ yij^^j«^ >jy- vjy' >j< vjv vjv >?v >K w w >i< >?< w >?< w >t«^ >isr October Twenty-ninth I have been a hundred times struck with the circumstance that the most remote facts are constantly striking each other ; just as vessels starting from ports thousands of miles apart pass close to each other in the naked breadth of the ocean. Tlie Professor. October Thirtieth Blushing means nothing, in some persons ; in others, it betrays a profound inward agitation, — a perturbation of the feelings far more try- ing than the passions which with many easily moved persons break forth in tears. Elsie Venner. October Thirty-first Nature and custom would, no doubt, agree in conceding to all males the right of at least two distinct looks at every comely female coun- tenance, without any infraction of the rules of courtesy or the sentiment of respect. The first look is necessary to define the person of the in- dividual one meets so as to avoid it in passing. Any unusual attraction detected in a first glance is a sufficient apology for a second, not a pro- longed and impertinent stare, but an appreci- ating homage of the eyes. The Autocrat. [106] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES NOVEMBER November First To those who know the Indian summer of our Northern States, it is needless to describe the influence it exerts on the senses and the soul. The stillness of the landscape in that beautiful time is as if the planet were sleeping, like a top, before it begins to rock with the winds of au- tunm. All natures seem to find themselves more truly in its light ; love grows more tender, mem- ory sees farther back into the past. The Guardian Angel. November Second Then fill a fair and honest cup, and bear it straight to me ; The goblet hallows all it holds, whate'er the liquid be; And may the cherubs on its face protect me from the sin, That dooms one to those dreadful words, — "My dear, where have you been?" On Lending a Punch-Bowl. [107] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES NovEMBEE Third Where, oh where are Hfe's HIies and roses, Nursed in the golden dawn's smile? Dead as the bulrushes round little Moses, On the old banks of the Nile. Questions and Answers. November Fourth Talking is like playing on the harp ; there is as much in laying the hand on the strings to stop their vibrations as in twanging them to bring out their music. The Autocrat. November Fifth Oh, what a precious book the one would be That taught observers what they're not to see! Urania. November Sixth Perhaps too far in these considerate days Has Patience carried her submissive ways ; Wisdom has taught us to be calm and meek. To take one blow and turn the other cheek ; It is not written what a man shall do, If the rude caitiff strike the other too ! Astrcea. I 108 ] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES NovEMBEE Seventh Sing the sweet song of other days, Serenely placid, safely true. And o'er the present's parching ways Thy verse distills like evening dew. But speak in words of living power, — They fall like drops of scalding rain That plashed before the burning shower Swept o'er the cities of the plain ! Saint Anthony, the Reformer. November Eighth A man's opinions, look you, are generally of much more value than his arguments. These last are made by his brain, and perhaps he does not believe the proposition they tend to prove — as is often the case with paid lawyers ; but opinions are formed by our whole nature — brain, heart, instinct, brute life, everything all our experience has shaped for us by contact with the whole circle of our being. The Professor. November Ninth The true essentials of a feast are only fun and feed. Nux Postcoenatica. [ 109 ] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES 7^ y^ '/^ vtK '/;< viK WiK 'j^y^yiK >j>f -^ >j< >?<; 'j^yi^T^yfK November Tenth I love you is all the secret that many, nay, most women have to tell. When that is said, they are like China-crackers on the morning of the fifth of July. And just as that little patri- otic implement is made with a slender train which leads to the magazine in its interior, so a sharp eye can almost always see the train leading from a young girl's e^'e or lip to the "I love you" in her heart. The Professor. November Eleventh On the whole, I had ratlicr judge men's minds by comparing their thoughts with my own, than judge of thoughts by knowing who utter them. I must do one or the other. It docs not follow, of course, that I may not recognize another man's thoughts as broader and deeper than my own ; but that does not necessarily change my opinion, otherwise this would be at the mercy of every superior mind that held a different one. The Autocrat. November Twelfth Look in his face, to meet thy neighbor's soul, Not on his garments, to detect a hole. Urania. [110] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES November Thirteenth The rapidity with which ideas grow old in our memories is in a direct ratio to the squares of their importance. Their apparent age runs up miraculously, like the value of diamonds, as they increase in magnitude. A great calamity, for instance, is as old as the trilobites an hour after it has happened. It stains backward through all the leaves we have turned over in the book of life, before its blot of tears or of blood is dry on the page we are turning. For this we seem to have lived ; it was foreshadowed in dreams that we leaped out of in the cold sweat of terror ; in the "dissolving views" of dark day-visions ; all omens pointed to it ; all paths led to it. After the tossing half-forgetfulness of the first sleep that follows such an event, it comes upon us afresh, as a surprise, at waking ; in a few moments it is old again, — old as eternity. The Autocrat. November Fourteenth All of us have a little speck of fight under- neath our peace and good-will to men — just a speck, for revolutions and great emergencies, you know — so that we should not submit to be trodden quite flat by the first heavy-heeled ag- gressor that came along. The Professor. [Ill] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES ■y^ >j< >jv 7?^>j^ >?< yfi. yiK^iiryiK >k vjv v?< >jvv;*t -j^-??*?--?!? November Fifteenth How many of our cherished behefs are like those drinking-glasses of the ancient pattern, that serve us well so long as we keep them in our hand, but spill all if we attempt to set them down! The Autocrat. November Sixteenth As o'er the glacier's frozen sheet Breathes soft the Alpine rose, So, through life's desert springing sweet The flower of friendship grows. A Song of Other Days. November Seventeenth Stillness of person and steadiness of features are signal marks of good-breeding. Vulgar persons can't sit still, or at least, they must work their limbs or features. The Professor. November Eighteenth Children of wealth or want, to each is given One spot of green, and all the blue of heaven ! Enough, if tliese their outward shows impart; The rest is thine, — the scenery of the heart. Urania. [112] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES yfi vfi. yfK Vi<. y^K -^^ y^K yiit< >?< v^^tjv; >j< >??<7??-??«:>K>?^>?ir>?^>K>K>;^>;^">^7?^ November Twenty-second I tell you this odd thing: there are a good many persons, who, through the habit of mak- ing other folks uncomfortable, by finding fault with all their cheerful enjoyments, at last get up a kind of hostility to comfort in general, even in their own persons. The correlative to loving our neighbors as ourselves is hating our- selves as we hate our neighbors. The Professor. November Twenty-third Sweet is the scene where genial friendship plays The pleasing game of interchanging praise. Terpsichore. November Twenty-fourth Gentility is a fine thing, not to be under- valued; but humanity comes before that. The Professor. November Twenty-fifth For baser tribes the rivers flow That know not wine or song; Man wants but little drink below, But wants that Httle strong. A Song of Other Days. [lU] FROI^I DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES November Twenty-sixth Truth's sleepless watchman on her midnight tower, Whose lamp burns brightest when the tempests lower — Oh, who can tell with what a leaden flight Drag the long watches of his weary night ; While at his feet the hoarse and blinding gale Strews the torn wreck and bursts the fragile sail, When stars have faded, when the wave is dark. When rocks and sands embrace the foundering bark, And still he pleads with unavailing cry. Behold the light, O wanderer, look or die! A Modest Request. November Twenty-seventh People never hear their own voices, — any more than they see their own faces. There is not even a looking-glass for the voice. Of course, there is something audible to us when we speak; but that something is not our own voice as it is known to all our acquaintances. How pleasant it would be, if in another state of being we could have shapes like our own for- mer selves for playthings ! The Autocrat. [115] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES y^KH^Ky^i. yi< >?< '^ yt< vjo^TprTj^T^rTj^-VK^KT^^j^^K November Twenty-eighth Once in a while one meets with a single soul greater than all the living pageant that passes before it. As the pale astronomer sits in his study with sunken eyes and thin fingers, and weighs Uranus or Neptune as in a balance, so there are meek, slight women who have weighed all that this planetary life can offer, and hold it like a bauble in the palm of their slender hands. The Autocrat. November Twenty-ninth Conceit is just as natural a thing to human minds as a center is to a circle. The Professor. November Thirtieth I am too much a lover of genius, I sometimes think, and too often get impatient with dull people, so that, in their weak talk, where noth- ing is taken for granted, I look forward to some future possible state of development, when a gesture passing between a beautiful human soul and an archangel shall signify as much as the complete history of a planet. Yet, when a strong brain is weighed with a true heart, it seems to me like balancing a bubble against a wedge of gold. The Professor. [IIG] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES DECEMBER December First Behold the rocky wall That down its sloping sides Pours the swift raindrops, blending, as they fall. In rushing river-tides ! Yon stream, whose sources run Turned by a pebble's edge, Is Athabasca, rolling toward the sun Through the cleft mountain-ledge. The slender rill had strayed. But for the slanting stone, To evening's ocean, with the tangled braid Of foam-flecked Oregon. So from the heights of Will Life's parting stream descends. And, as a moment turns its slender rill, Each widening torrent bends, — From the same cradle's side. From the same mother's knee, — One to long darkness and the frozen tide, One to the Peaceful Sea! The Two Streams. [in] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES December Second What is there quite so profoundly human as an old man's memory of a mother who died in his earlier years? Mother she remains till man- hood, and by-and-by she grows to be as a sis- ter ; and at last, when, wrinkled and bowed and broken, he looks back upon her in her fair youth, he sees in the sweet image he caresses not his parents, but, as it were, his child. The Professor. December Third Women decant their affections, sweet and sound, out of the old bottles into the new ones, — off from the lees of the last generation, clear and bright, into the clean vessels just made ready to receive it. The Guardian Angel. December Fourth After all, if we think of it, most of the world's loves and friendships have been between people that could not read nor spell. The Autocrat. December Fifth A man always loves a woman, and a woman a man, unless some good reason exists to the contrary. Elsie Venner. [118] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES >j< >?< vjv v?«k y^y Hv Hv y;v>?< >t< v?< Hv viv yiv yiy7?^>??7ir Decembee Sixth Women are such strange creatures ! Is there any trick that love and their own fancies do not play them? Just see how they marry ! The Professor. December Seventh Audacious self-esteem, with good ground for it, is always imposing. The Autocrat. December Eighth Lord of all life, below, above. Whose light is truth, whose warmth is love, Before thy ever-blazing throne We ask no luster of our own. Grant us thy truth to make us free. And kindling hearts that burn for thee. Till all thy hving altars claim One holy light, one heavenly flame! A Sun-Day Hymn. December Ninth It isn't what a man thinks or says, but when and where and to whom he thinks and says it. The Professor. [119] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES VJV VJV >!>(>?< HV >JV V^ VJ^T^ViV ViV ViV >JV ViK >?«C7??>J^7?C December Tenth The pledge of Friendship ! it is still divine, Though watery floods have quenched its burn- ing wine; Whatever vase the sacred drops may hold, The gourd, the shell, the cup of beaten gold. Around its brim the hand of Nature throws A garland sweeter than the banquet's rose. Bright are the blushes of the vine-wreathed bowl. Warm with the sunshine of Anacreon's soul, But dearer memories gild the tasteless wave That fainting Sidney perished as he gave. A Sentiment. December Eleventh It does not follow that I wish to be pickled in brine because I like a salt-water plunge. The Professor. December Twelfth Money kept for two or three generations transforms a race, — I don't mean merely in manners and hereditary culture, but in blood and bone. Money buys air and sunshine, in which children grow up more kindly, of course, than in close, back streets ; it buys country places to give them happy and healthy summers. The Autocrat. [120] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES >jv yj< >jOix ■Mt'i. ytK vj< vjv >K>?*r>t*r">?ir December Thirteenth My broken Mirror ! faithless, j^et beloved, Thou who canst smile, and smile alike on all. Oft do I leave thee, oft again return, I scorn the siren, but obey the call ; I hate thy falsehood, while I fear thy truth, But most I love thee, flattering friend of youth. To My Companions. December Fourteenth All we can do with books of human experi- ence is to make them alive again with something borrowed from our own lives. We can make a book alive for us just in proportion to its re- semblance in essence or in form to our own experience. The Autocrat. December Fifteenth The soul, having studied the article of which it finds itself proprietor, thinks, after a time, it knows it pretty well. But there is this dif- ference between its view and that of a person looking at us: — we look from within, and see nothing but the mould formed by the elements in which we are incased: other observers look from without, and see us as living statues. The Professor. [m] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES December Sixteenth Not in the world of light alone, Where God has built His blazing throne, Nor yet alone in earth below, With belted seas that come and go, And endless isles of sunlit green, Is all thy Maker's glory seen: Look in upon thy wondrous frame, — Eternal wisdom still the same ! The Living Temple. December Seventeekth I hope I love good people, not for their sake, but for my own. The Professor. December Eighteenth A calm, clear mind, not subject to the spasms and crises which are so often met with in cre- ative or intensely perceptive natures, is the best basis for love or friendship. The Autocrat. December Nineteenth Be firm ! one constant element in luck Is genuine, solid, old Teutonic pluck ; See you tall shaft ; it felt the earthquake's thrill, Clung to its base, and greets the sunrise still. Urania. [122] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES >?<>?<>?<>?< >j< v?< >?v vjv7tr>t< '/^yi^yi^y^ >j<>?»c>?<7??^ December Twentieth Though temples crowd the crumbled brink O'erhanging truth's eternal flow, Their tablets bold with what we thinks Their echoes dumb to what we know; That one unquestioned text we read. All doubt beyond, all fear above. Nor crackling pile nor cursing creed Can burn or blot it: God is Love! What We All Think. December Twenty-first I am proud to say, that Nature has so far en- riched me, that I cannot own so much as a duck without seeing in it as pretty a swan as ever swam. The Autocrat. December Twenty-second And what if court or castle vaunt Its children loftier born? — Who heeds the silken tassel's flaunt Beside the golden corn? They ask not for the dainty toil Of ribboned knights and earls, The daughters of the virgin soil. Our free-born Yankee girls ! Our Yankee Girls, [123] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES v*x ^4*. J-4X Aix xix x*x xix xiy >?v vfv >;< >?< 7?«rs?? >?>r??«:>?<:7pr December Twenty-third Home of our childhood! how affection clings And hovers round thcc with her seraph wings! Dearer thy hills, though clad in autumn brown, Than fairest summits which the cedars crown ! Sweeter the fragrance of thy summer breeze Than all Arabia breathes along the seas ! The stranger's gale wafts home the exile's sigh, For the heart's temple is its own blue sky! Poetry — A Metrical Essay. December Twenty-fourth 'Tis the heart's current lends the cup its glow, Whate'er the fountain whence the draught may flow. A Sentiment. December Twenty-fifth The choral host had closed the angel's strain Sung to the midnight watch on Bethlehem's plain ; And now the shepherds, hastening on their way. Sought the still hamlet where the Infant lay. "Joy, joy to earth ! Behold the hallowed morn ! In David's city Christ the Lord is born! 'Glory to God I' let angels shout on high, — 'Good-will to men!' the listening Earth reply!" A Mother's Secret. [12J.] FROM DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES December Twenty-sixth And if I should live to be The last leaf upon the tree In the spring, Let them smile, as I do now. At the old forsaken bough Where I cling. The Last Leaf. December Twenty-seventh Life, as we call it, is nothing but the edge of the boundless ocean of existence where it comes on soundings. In this view, I do not see anything so fit to talk about, or half so inter- esting, as that which relates to the innumerable majority of our fellow-creatures, the dead-liv- ing, who are hundreds of thousands to one of the live-living, and with whom we all potentially belong. The Professor. December Twenty-eighth Venice built her Ducal Palace, and her Church of St. Mark, and her Casa d'Oro, and the rest of her golden houses ; and Venice had great pictures and good music ; and Venice had a Golden Book, in which all the large tax-payers had their names written ; — But all that did not make Venice the brain of Italy. I'he Professor. [125] FRO:\I DAY TO DAY WITH HOLMES December Twenty-ninth Call him not old, whose visionary brain Holds o'er the past its undivided reign. For him in vain the envious seasons roll Who bears eternal summer in his soul. If yet the minstrel's song, the poet's lay, Spring with her birds, or children with their play, Or maiden's smile, or heavenly dream of art Stir the few life-drops creeping round his heart, — Turn to the record where his years are told, — Count his gray hairs, — they cannot make him old ! Call Him Not Old. December Thirtieth God bless all good women! — to their soft hands and pitying hearts we must all come at last! TJie Autocrat. December Thirty-first We will not speak of years to-night; For what have years to bring, But larger floods of love and light And sweeter songs to sing? At a Birthduy Festival, [126] JL 13 t9M 3UL ^3 ^9^^ One copy del. to Cat. Div. ful 13 «aif Illililliuiiiuiuuiiiiiuiui LIBRARY r" CONGRESS 015 863 575 6 #,