The Vancouver independent. (Vancouver, W.T. [Wash.]) 1875-1910, 1877-07-12
Harriet Martineau.
BY JAS. FREEMAN CLARK.

welded with warriors joy, in the con-
fict of truth with error, of right with
wrong. She wrote many books; but
articles in reviews and newspapers were
innumerable. We find no attempt in
either part of this biography to give
complete list of her writings. Perhaps
it would be impossible. She never seems
to have thought of keeping such rec
ord herself, any more than hero re-
cords the number of the blows he strikes
in battle. No sooner had she dismissed
one task than another came; and some
times several were going on together.
Like other voluminous writers, she en-
loved the exercise of her productive
powers; and, as she somewhere tells US,
her happiest hours we're those in which
she was seated at her desk with her pen.
Each thing she did had for its purpose
nothing merely personal, but some good
to mankind. Though there was nothing
in her character of the sentimeutalism
of philanthropy, she was filled with the
spirit of philanthropy. A born reformer,
she inherited from her Huguenot ances-
tors the love of truth and the hatred of
error, with the courage which was ready
to avow her opinions, however unpopu-
lar. Thus, her work was warfare, and
every article or book which she printed
was blow delivered against some
fragrant wrong, or what she believed
such-in defence of some struggling
truth, OF something supposed to be
truth. She might be mistaken; but her
purposes through life were, in the main,
noble, generous, and good.
In 1884, at the age of thirty two, Har-
riet Martineau sailed for the United
States, where she remained two years.
She went for rest; but the quantity of
work done in those two years would have
been enough to fill five or six years of
any common life. At this point she be-
gan a new career; forming new ties, en-
gagipg in new duties, studying new
problems, and beginning new activity
in another sphere of labor. The same
great qualities which she had hitherto
displayed showed themselves here again:
accompanied with their corresponding
defects. Her wonderful power of study
enabled her to enter into the very midst
Of the phenomena of American life; her
noble generosity induced her to throw
herself heart, hand and mind into the
greatest struggle then raging on the face
of the earth. The anti-savery question,
which the great majority of people of
culture despised or disliked, took pos
session of her soul. She became one of
the party Of Abolitionists, of which Mr..
Garrison was the chief, and lived to see
that party triumph in the downfall of
a. hA tar Sh Of
hatred or the scorn heaped on that fiery
body of Jealous propagandists, and was
counted worthy of belonging to what she
herself called 1.-The Martyr Age of the
United States"
In 1888, when thirty-six years old, she
was taken with a serious illness, which
confined her to her room for six years.
She attributes this illness to her anxiety
about her aged aunt and mother. Her
mother, she tells US, was irritable on ac-
count of Miss Martineau's fame and po-
sition in society; in short, she was jealous
of her daughters success. Miss Mar
tineau was obliged, she says, to sit up
late after midnight to mend her own
clothes, as she was not allowed to have a
maid or to hire working-woman, even
ut her own expense. How she could
have been prevented is difficult to see,
especially as she was the money making
member Of the family. 1t seems hardly
worth while to give us this glimpse into
domestic difficulties. But, no doubt,
she il quite correct in adding, as an
other reason for her illness, the tolls
which we're breaking her down. The
strongest men could hardly bear such
sfrsin on the nervous system without CIV
ing way.
happy and peaceful. She had . plsaeent
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