Buchanan County bulletin. [volume] (Independence, Iowa) 1869-1891, 1876-04-28
Friendship and Letters.
Blackwood's Magazine.

Blackwoods Magazine.
Friendship makes letter-writers-it
is one of its offices and good works;
especially are the friendships of wo-
men fruitful in this private domestic
literature. The letters of Miss Car
ter and Miss Talbot show friend
ship sustained on very high level
of thought and feelings; and others
more recent and more familiar to the
general reader show examples more
than enough. Yet we are tempted
to give one letter, the close of long
friendship, as testimony to the
strength and fidelity of this relation,
perhaps especially among women
1t is from Lady Charlotte Lindsay
noted for her wit and that plainness
of features of which she remarked,
on growing old, that time had taken
away the bloom of her ugliness, and
reduced her to the common-place-to
her friends, the Misses Borry. Both
these ladies were between eighty and
ninety, and how far the writer was
on the wrong side of seventy we had
no ready means of asccrtainlng:
dec. IA, 1871 cannot wait till half.
past six, but must say word now to
thank you for all the kind tokens | got
yesterday. You say that you arc the
most grateful of my friends Dearest
Mary, that gratitude is due to your Crea-
tor, who made you so lovablc that could
"a R,,f Wi IL,
do | owe Him, who, when | had the mis-
fortune to survive all those who were
nearest and dearest to me, disposed two
hearts, like yours and dear Agnes, to re-
ccive into your intimacy and warm afTec-
ton a heart that must otherwise have
withered in hopeless solitude! Whenever
either of you feel low and discouraged, as
we all do at times, say to yourselves
There is one creature at least who owes
to us the comfort of her better days"
Letters are an invaluable sustainer
of friendship, but no friendship can
live on them. 1t Is delusion that a
mere correspondence, whether daily,
monthly or weekly, can supply the
ailment for lively, tenacious, thor
ough friendship; there must be
personal intercourse; for one reason,
the letters, to be intimate and unre-
strained, and written in any mood,
and upon the spur of the moment,
cannot fail now and to jar upon the
receiver When two people talk they
are alive to each others state Of tenn
per and feeling. No one can guess
the condition Of his friend at the
time he receives his letter. 1t may
be written on impulse, and read in
WEAKNESS, or in testy mood. Or if
cheerful a jest falls upon a sore
place. A snub may be detected
where none was meant, n thought
written under the presence of strong
feeling may be misunderstood. Let
ters cannot attempt to supply the
place of conversation between two
minds without making room for some
of these bitches; and if the topics of
the letters never touch on delicate
themes, never approach points where
there may be difference of opinion,
then they do not keep friendship
alive at the proper heat. All great
friendships live in personal inter-
course. And therefore it is that thore
are SO few of them; and therefore
that they do not remain unlmpaired
and in full strength to old age; and
therefore Incidence should not stand
in the way of as frequent meetings
as the engagements of life will per-
NIT. We have such facilities for this
frequent intercourse as the world
never knew before; but may not the
increased luxury of living throw in
difficulties in a new direction? If
we have to make new preparations
for the due reception of our friend,
the invitation often does not get sent.
When Bishop Sanderson and his
dear and most intimate friend, the
learned DR.. Hammond, met "to en-
joy quiet conversation and rest to-
gether, for some days at 4 time" we
may be sure the fare would be sim
pie, and where n good apple was
with one the chosen dclicacy, the
dessert easily procured. IT'S the eye to
eye, voice with voice encounter, that
keeps such friendships alive, and the
inequalities of welcome are their
great promoter.